


The Sisters Three

by unknown_knowns



Category: Life Is Strange (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Angst, Everyone kind of has a lot of issues they're working through, F/F, Gossip, Protective Siblings, Shitty Relationships with Parents, Sibling Bonding, Sibling Love, Sibling Rivalry, Siblings, Siblings AU, Slow Burn, lots of cute sibling stuff tbh, quick burn marymus almost immediately, slow burn chasefield starting chapter 5
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-24
Updated: 2017-06-11
Packaged: 2018-10-10 05:54:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 24,392
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10430601
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unknown_knowns/pseuds/unknown_knowns
Summary: Growing up is different with siblings.Victoria knows they can cast an inescapably long shadow.Max knows they can offer you a mold for how to better live.Chloe knows they can be your last remaining pillar of stability.But things change.All three younger sisters struggle to find their place in the world, and at Blackwell.When their sisters aren't around to guide them anymore.





	1. Interesting

**Author's Note:**

> Hello, friends.
> 
> This work is based on Todd's [Siblings AU](http://skiretehfox.tumblr.com/tagged/siblings-au). It's really just fantastically cute and gay and resonant. You should go look at the art if you haven't already!
> 
> This story is paced to take a few chapters to introduce all of the characters and their interplay. Since the cast is large and the interplay is the meat of this AU, I felt that was important to front-load. We do eventually get to blackwell though, and if you're in it for the gay, that comes quickly too!
> 
> As always, I appreciate any comments, and will try to read/reply to every one of them.

Knock knock.

Maximus sighed wearily and looked from her computer to her door.

“It’s open.”

Her mother opened the door and leaned on the frame.

She crossed her arms.

Maximus carefully turned her chair around and leaned over with her hands clasped together.

“Hmmm?”

Somewhere between a grunt and a proper vocalization.

Her mother sighed, but was used to this kind of terseness.

“Remember? The soiree with the Chases? I’m sure they’ll have lots of beautiful art. You’ll like it.”

Quiet.

Maximus just shrugged.

“I can see art anywhere. There’s only going to be boring people there.”

Her mother frowned for all of a few seconds before she had the sense to hide it.

She then smiled, and stood up straight, righting herself from her previous posture on the doorframe.

“Well. Your father and I are going. If you want to stay, you’ll have to babysit your sisters.”

Maximus groaned and looked upwards to her ceiling.

“Mo _oo_ om.”

After a moment of hesitation, she looked back down to her mother.

“I have things to do.”

Her mother kept her smile, despite the reluctance.

“Please? For me? I’ll tell you what - you can wear the suit. I’m sure the Chases won’t mind, like ---“

Her smile cracked.

Maximus’ face harshened.

Quiet.

After a few moments, her mother just shook her head with another sigh.

“It’ll be fine. I promise. Now please, get ready, and go tell your sisters to, too. They’ll listen to you.”

Maximus grunted again.

But it was more thoughtful, this time.

She stood up.

“Alright.”

Her mother smiled broadly, again.

 

This suit was more than a little dressy.

A proper gentleman’s suit, complete with tails.

Now that they were "well off", they were sometimes expected to dress so impressively.

 

But she wasn't going to be found in a dress.

A suit felt better.

More protecting.

More enabling.

More emboldening.

Her posture became more appropriate, standing fully upright and with her arms carefully folded behind her back.

She didn’t need to hold her chin up high to exude confidence.

It came with the package.

She opened the door to her sisters’ room.

She didn’t knock.

Why bother.

 

Both of her sisters sat in the middle of their room, on the floor.

Between their beds, which flanked them on the far sides of the room.

The younger of the two, Max, immediately looked up.

She was sitting but her body was facing the door, anyway.

The middle child, Maxine, was focused on Max’s hands.

“Shh! Don’t move. I’m almost done.”

Max squeaked and lowered her head back down.

She breathed in carefully and tried to be as still as possible.

“But. ‘ximmie.”

Maxine froze herself, and looked behind to Maximus.

“Oh! ‘xim! Just a seccy.”

Maxine smiled wide.

She always seemed to.

“I’m doing Max’s nails.”

She kept eye contact for just a few seconds before turning back around and returning her attention to Max’s hands.

When neither of them were looking, Maximus allowed herself a quiet moment to smile gently.

But it was just that, a quiet, fleeting moment, and soon she walked into the room properly to loom over the two.

Max couldn’t help but look up again to her oldest sister, despite any complaints her other sister offered.

Eventually,

“There!”

Maxine beamed proudly and blew on Max’s nails for a few moments.

They both then stood up, and faced Maximus.

Max didn’t really know what to do with her hands.

All the same, Maxine was interested in tugging them in front, so show them  off.

“Look, ‘xim! Aren’t they cute? I think blue is really Max’s color.”

Maximus kept her face flat and unfeeling, intentionally or not.

But she did look down to Maxine’s effort on Max’s nails.

She had to admit, they were done well.

Even if she’d never be caught dead with painted nails herself.

“It’s …”

Maxine blinked.

Max looked up with such a crushingly hopeful gaze.

“… Cute.”

Maxine beamed again.

Max didn’t stop looking at her older sister, eyes wide and grin all-consuming.

Maximus reciprocated.

But then remembered herself, and shook her head firmly.

Her face was back to its comfortable flatness.

“But, like, anyway.”

She looked to Maxine.

“We’re going to an event. You two need to get ready.”

Maxine gasped.

“Ooo! That sounds like fun. Doesn’t it sound like fun, Max?”

They both looked to Max.

Max shifted on her feet, and looked around, unsure how to handle the gaze of both of her sisters at once.

“I-I. Um. I guess?”

Maxine sighed, and frowned for a few moments.

Maximus looked to Max, then Maxine, then back again.

She moved and placed her hand on Max’s shoulder.

Max squeaked in surprise and shot her face right back up.

“We’ll all be there. It’ll be fine. You can stay by me if you want.”

Max opened her mouth to say something, but she couldn’t think of anything.

Instead, she just closed her mouth again after a few moments and smiled again.

It was all the convincing she needed.

 

“’xim.”

Maximus’ mother.

Maximus broke her attention away from the glass of the interior car window to look sidelong.

Her mother wasn’t looking back anyway.

“Mm?”

Another half-grunt half-vocalization.

“We’re almost there. You’re not going to zone out when we’re there, are you?”

Maximus hesitated on a response.

Quiet.

Her eye shifted to the rolling scenery around them again.

“’unno. Maybe if it’s boring.”

Her mother sighed, heavy and beleaguered.

Maximus could visualize her mother shaking her head.

She was never particularly fond of the way her eldest handled social interactions.

Whatever.

It’s not her fault people were so inexorably boring.

Always talking and thinking about inconsequential things.

No one could function on the same wavelength as her.

Max squeezed Maximus’ hand.

The sisters all sat three abreast in the back seat of the car.

Max took it upon herself to sit next to her eldest sister and burrow into her side.

A creature comfort.

But it kept her placated and content for any duration of journey.

Maximus squeezed back, and carefully looked in her direction.

Max almost looked asleep, with her face calm and eyes closed, head resting on her sister’s shoulder like that.

Maxine looked anything but, with her face diligently pouring over the contents of her own phone.

“The Chases have their own daughters, you know.”

Maximus grunted flatly.

Who cares.

“With a family that’s so invested into art … they might be able to keep up with you.”

Her mother’s words danced playfully by the end.

Maximus exhaled, amused, and looked more directly towards her mother this time.

“That’s not the first time you’ve said that.”

Her mother smiled.

“This time is different. I’ve already met them.”

Quiet.

“They’re good kids.”

Quiet.

“Their eldest has a few pieces in some of the nearby galleries.”

Maximus blinked.

This broke her silence.

“How old _is_ she?”

Her mother’s smile widened.

“About your age.”

Maximus grunted again, and shifted around on her seat.

Her baby sister shifted around patiently with her.

She went back to looking at the window, and considered.

She didn’t need to tell her mother that she found it impressive.

That smug grin gave her the impression she already knew, anyway.

Maybe it was bunk.

Maybe the Chases just forced their daughter’s art into places.

They did own some galleries, after all.

Maybe she’d have to find out.

 

\---

 

This wasn’t anxiety.

This was something else.

Something more innocuous.

Maybe that food she had just ate didn’t settle well in her stomach.

Maybe her skin was somewhat sunburned.

Maybe she was a bit too aggressive on exfoliating last night.

There was some manner or some logic as to why Victoria’s clothes felt uncomfortable.

Like her skin was revolting against her body.

Still.

Her older sister was right next to her.

She couldn’t afford to let it show.

She was a Chase, after all.

Victoria followed her sister’s gaze.

She’d been looking at her own camera, flicking through the photos on it.

No matter how quiet or alone they were, Victoria’s sister never seemed to be troubled.

Even now, just with the two of them sitting alone in their garden, and no one to impress upon but Victoria, she remained resolutely peaceful and at ease.

Just one of the things Victoria was deeply and resoundingly jealous about.

Her sister’s face cracked into a smile, suddenly, and she looked up from her camera to Victoria.

“It’s almost time for the guests to be here.”

She sighed pleased and closed her eyes for a few moments.

She breathed in calmly.

Quiet.

Victoria fidgeted in her seat.

“You should really talk to some of them.”

Victoria groaned at her sister’s incessant reminders.

She peeled her gaze away and off to nowhere in particular.

She crossed her arms.

Her sister frowned, not that Victoria could see it.

“I mean it. Father’s a little worried, you know?”

As though it was possible to not know.

Victoria didn’t frown, despite the growing feeling of resentment, because it was improper.

She was a Chase.

She didn’t let her emotions show.

“I’m fine. I don’t need anyone.”

Victoria kept her delivery perfectly flat and unfeeling.

It was a tone that worked well with her parents.

Her sister sighed.

Much to Victoria’s chagrin, it was _also_ a tone that her sister could see through easily.

She always seemed so capable of doing so.

“Okay. I won’t push you on this.”

Victoria blinked, and looked back to her sister.

“Mary --- _what_?”

Victoria’s sister, Mary, carefully stood up from her seat and patted herself off.

She returned Victoria’s gaze.

And smiled.

“You need your time. I get it. Father thinks you can just waltz up to someone and become fast friends.”

Victoria shifted around again.

Her eyes briefly broke contact.

Mary continued,

“But I know you. You’re not just going to bond with anyone, Vee.”

Victoria went quiet.

It frustrated her that her sister saw through her so effortlessly.

She didn’t _want_ to be the baby sister that _needed_ this kind of attention.

If only wanting was enough.

Victoria stood up as well.

She opened her mouth to say something, but ---

“Just --- try, please? For me? Give me _something_ I can tell father about.”

Victoria chewed on the bottom of her lip.

She could hear the concern in Mary’s voice.

She didn’t want to be the kind of person to need this encouragement, but.

She also didn’t want to worry her sister.

Quiet, then,

“No promises.”

Mary exhaled, amused.

She closed her eyes.

“Marvelous.”

 

\---

 

Out of the car, and into the event.

Maximus’ mother guided the trio out of the car and into some manner of garden.

The mansion – Chase Mansion – loomed large behind them.

Like it was watching.

“Okay, sweetie ---“

Maximus’ mother stopped in her tracks.

She turned around to face her directly.

Despite the fact there were three of them, her mother usually only talked to her.

Such was the life of the eldest sister.

 “I’m going to have a pleasant conversation with Mr. Chase indoors about next year.”

Maximus blinked.

She’d almost forgotten about that.

“In the meantime, I want you to watch over your sisters, okay?”

Her mother hesitated.

“And, please, have some fun?”

Her mother looked around, briefly.

“There’s a lot of people here you can talk to. I’m sure you can find _someone._ ”

She then breathed in deep, and looked back to Maximus.

“Okay, mom.”

Her mother smiled, and quickly shot her hand to rustle and agitate Maximus’ hair.

“Thanks, sweetie. Be good.”

Maximus, for her part, indignantly groaned and raised her own hands up as protest.

“ _Mom_!”

The torture was short-lived, though.

And Max’s earned giggle was a wonderful panacea for her annoyance.

 

When her mother was out of sight, Maximus turned to face her sisters.

And …

Maxine was already gone.

She sighed.

Of course.

Like Maxine could possibly be expected stand still for so long when there were so many new faces around.

But Max was still here.

Of course.

She looked down to her baby sister.

She always seemed to be looking back up.

They both shared a smile for a little while.

Max was not … wonderful in large group settings like this.

With so much noise and so many strangers around.

But they had an arrangement of sorts.

So natural and fluid that they needn’t even confirm it verbally, at this point.

Maximus just reached her hand out and Max happily took it, intertwining their fingers.

They’d navigate the crowds together.

 

It wasn’t very long until a stranger approached them directly.

A boy, about Maximus’ age.

“Hiyo! I haven’t seen you before!”

When Maximus stood, she kept one hand folded behind her back, and the other carefully holding Max’s hand.

She stood tall and proud and confident and firm and unyielding and sharp.

It wasn’t as intimidating as the flatness of her expression, though.

Despite this particular stranger’s warmth and ease in casual conversation, her gaze was enough to get him to shift on his feet.

“What a shame. I liked it better when you hadn’t.”

The stranger flinched visibly at the snark and his face contorted into disgust for all of a few moments before he had the presence of mind to hide it.

Max giggled again.

She always enjoyed her sister’s attitude.

It made her feel like she was with the cool kids.

“Excuse you.”

The stranger decided it was enough, and brushed his way past her.

Maximus didn’t watch him go.

She just tugged Max deeper into the gardens.

Towards the house.

There wasn’t going to be any interesting people out here.

Only sycophants and socialites.  

No, her kinds of people would be inside.

With the art.

 

_The art._

Moving inside was a good idea.

Even if she was to find no peers of her age within, the art was worth it alone.

All manner of legendary and stunning originals lined the walls within the Chase mansion.

The affections of people who genuinely cared about this world.

While Maximus could have roamed the halls indefinitely, just admiring the impressive collection, she was arrested by one piece in particular.

She stopped dead in front of it, and thoughtlessly raised both of her hands to it.

But, of course, she knew better, and simply clenched her fists shy of making actual contact.

She crossed her arms and studied the piece, instead.

Admiring the layers.

The texture of the canvas.

The detail in both what the artist decided to paint.

And what the artist decided _not_ to.

The contrasting of colors, both in pleasing and jarring ways.

The ---

“Someone is entranced.”

Maximus blinked and breathed in.

A man’s voice.

Deep and old.

Painfully, she removed her intense gaze and looked to the source of the voice.

Remembering herself, she also uncrossed her arms and brought both hands to the small of her back again.

“Hard not to. This an original from Avaliniatiae. It is a … requirement to be awestruck by his work.”

The man exhaled briefly, amused.

He smiled.

“What do you know of this piece, then?”

Maximus looked back to the piece and closed her eyes.

She breathed in deep, and let the air out carefully.

“He painted this in … I want to say 1794, in response to a lover’s quarrel.”

The man made an approving noise, some kind of thoughtful hum.

“Oh? A lover’s quarrel?”

The interest in his voice was genuine.

Maximus nodded thoughtlessly.

“Jean – his lover – cheated on him, with a woman. Enraged and consumed by jealousy, Avaliniatiae channeled his emotions into his brush and painted … _this._ You can still see the sheer strength he put into every individual stroke – the boldness of his colors – the sharpness of the contrast in the shapes – the …”

She stopped, suddenly, when she heard a camera shutter.

She looked around to find the source of the noise.

A crowd of adults gathered loosely around to watch the exchange.

But no one with a camera that she could see.

Wait ---

Maximus looked directly behind and around her.

And then brought her hands up.

Both of them.

As in two hands.

One of them should have been engaged holding Max’s hand.

Yet, clearly, it was not.

And she hadn’t seen Max when she looked around, just now.

Max was not good in crowds, the least of which when they were comprised of scary big adults.

And without her sister’s hand as comfort ---

“Excuse me.”

Maximus had to go find her.

Now.

“Wait.”

The man’s voice, though.

She’d already started to make her way out of the scene, but paused and looked back to him.

“What?”

“What is your name, my child?”

She frowned, a little bit, but then just shook her head.

“I am Maximus Caulfield. Now I must --- please ---”

The man smiled and waved his hand in a vague manner.

“Marvelous. Pleasure meeting you.”

Maximus simply walked off in response.

Worry and guilt were far too consuming to allow her to continue to engage in pleasantries.

Or bother to ask what his name was in return.

 

This suit wasn’t the most comfortable thing to move briskly in, but damn it all.

Where the hell had Max gotten off to?

She traced her steps back all of the way to the entrance to the garden.

There, she just raised a hand up to her lips and thought carefully.

What would she do were she were Max?

Where would she desire to go in a place such as this?

Maximus closed her eyes, tried to calm her breathing and stomach, and think.

When she opened her eyes again, she looked freshly at her surroundings.

What was the farthest, most isolated point she could see from here?

A reflecting pool, a ways off to the side of the garden, adjacent to the forest behind the Chase mansion.

Maximus bit her bottom lip.

There was no chance that Max would go back into the crowded garden alone.

And she wouldn’t have the nerve to explore an unknown house alone, either.

She would have traced her steps back just as Maximus had, and tried to find the calmest place.

That had to be it.

She had to have been there.

Maximus steeled herself, tried to put the worry out of her stomach, and quickly walked to the reflecting pool.

 

The air felt cooler over here.

But no Max.

Maximus grumbled intently and shoved her hands into her pockets.

This was … not good.

Looking at the calm waters of the reflecting pool, she had almost no choice but to start zoning out.

Reevaluating where Max could have gone to.

Anywhere but here.

She closed her eyes.

 

She heard a camera shutter, again.

Out here?

She breathed in carefully and opened her eyes to examine.

Her jaw very nearly dropped.

Max, with … some girl, on the other side of the reflecting pool.

They were making their way around.

Maximus didn’t need any encouragement to start walking briskly to meet them half way.

She took her hands out of her pockets somewhere along the way.

 

When they were within talking distance, Max hurriedly made her way from the girl’s side to Maximus’, again.

Maximus hugged her sister fiercely.

To the point that her fingers dug into her sister’s back and she used the grasp to lift her up, temporarily.

This too, always got a giggle out of her.

And today was no exception.

After putting her down and remembering herself, Maximus steeled her face, looked to the person Max had been with, and carefully folded her hands behind her back, again.

This time, Max took it upon herself to find one of Maximus’ hands to hold and intertwine with.

The woman that had brought Max to her was full of softness.

Her hair was a shade of blonde so bright and vibrant that it inspired jealously even among other blondes.

She wore her blindingly-white sundress with confidence, yet grace.

Her hands were clasped gently in front of her.

And that soft, warm smile.

Maximus had already given her way more attention than anyone else at this place simply because Max had trusted her.

Not a small achievement.

“You found my sister.”

The other woman looked between the two sisters, and her smile got wider, somehow.

She nodded gently.

“She found me.”

Maximus blinked, and looked sidelong to Max, before back to the stranger.

“What?”

The other woman laughed gently.

So very gently.

“While you were busy impressing my dad, your sister waltzed off and very nearly ran into me while I was trying to get a shot.”

The woman raised the camera that hand been slung over her shoulder.

Naturally, the camera’s strap was as stylish and pristine as the rest of her.

But there was a lot to unpack in that sentence, and Maximus furrowed her brow in concentration.

“Impressing your dad? Trying to get a shot? Of what?”

The woman laughed, again.

“Of what, she says. Here, why don’t you see for yourself?”

The woman moved closer.

Maximus noticed Max didn’t hide behind her further despite the proximity.

At some point her own posture had shifted, and the hand that was folded behind her back came to rest lazily by her side.

The woman offered her camera – there was a digital display on the back, showing a photo.

Maximus gasped.

The solidity to her features cracked.

This woman had taken a picture of her, but with great intentionality.

This wasn’t an average candid shot.

Maximus was standing dead perfect center in the frame, silhouetted by the lights that were illuminating the piece she was looking at.

The man from before on her flank, with a hand thoughtfully raised to his chin.

The wonderful art piece looming over her, dominating the rest of the frame.

“This is …”

Maximus was rarely without her words.

She was rarely impressed, either.

“Beautiful.”

She managed to complete her thought, but her words came with more difficulty, now.

They didn’t have the same harshness she used with most strangers anymore.

She carefully looked back up to the woman, and blinked a few times.

The woman just laughed again.

She smiled warmly and studied the new, more vulnerable expression on Maximus’ face.

Suddenly, the woman took a few hurried steps back and kneeled – she snapped her camera around and up and – _click._

The same camera shutter sound from before.

When the woman was finished, she walked back to the duo and offered her camera, again.

The resulting image wasn’t nearly as artistic or visually impressive, but there was an earnest nature to Maximus’ face in it.

It wasn’t aloof, it wasn’t distant, it wasn’t cold, it wasn’t calculating.

It was engaged.

Slightly in awe.

Her mouth was gaping ever so slightly, and Max just had such a cute smile on her face herself and –

“I like this one, too. Your little sister is cute as a button.”

Maximus was quiet for a few moments as she recomposed herself.

She then breathed in deep and just shook her head, to look more soberly at the woman.

“Yes, well. She takes after me.”

This earned both a giggle out of Max and a laugh out of the woman.

“Confidence. I like that. It’s easier to see how you impressed my dad so much.”

The woman’s smile turned wry.

“Even if you totally messed up your history. That piece was painted in 1798, not ’94. It took Avaliniatiae _years_ to work up the nerve to make a piece about his lurid love life so vividly.”

Maximus had _just_ managed to recompose herself and this woman just went and stunned her again.

Just full of surprises, apparently.

She wasn’t really sure why but the fact she had gotten her history wrong felt awful embarrassing in front of this woman.

She looked off into the distance, trying to ignore the blush on her cheeks.

But.

The woman gasped, suddenly, and shook her head.

“Oh, where _are_ my manners. I still haven’t told you my name – I was just so interested in getting your sister back to you and ---“

The woman stilled herself, breathed in deep, and put her camera back on her shoulder.

She then extended one of her hands.

“I’m Mary Chase.”

Maximus brought her attention back, and shook Mary’s hand.

“I’m Maximus Caulfield.”

She looked to her baby sister,

“This is Max.”

When she looked back, Mary’s eyebrows were furrowed and her lips were pursed, slightly.

“You’re both named Max? Isn’t that … confusing?”

Maximus exhaled, amused.

She shook her head.

“One, no, we’re not both named Max, two, no, because my family just calls me other things ---“

“--- I call her ‘ximmie!”

Maximus blinked.

Both Max and Mary giggled.

Maximus was probably blushing again.

Whatever.

She looked away.

A topic change was in order.

“A-anyway. Just call me Zim.”

Mary smiled warmly and nodded.

“Okay, Zim.”

Still.

Maximus looked back to Mary.

She breathed in.

“You know, Max doesn’t …”

She looked to her sister briefly before back again,

“… trust easily.”

Mary giggled.

“And my father doesn’t impress easily. Yet, here we are.”

Maximus exhaled.

“Here we are.”

 They both smiled for a few moments.

“I’ve heard much about you. We should ---“

Mary looked behind her, towards the house again,

“--- We should head back inside.”

Maximus nodded, and after quadruple-checking that Max was with her this time, started walking towards the house with Mary.

 

But they walked slowly.

They had a lot of questions for one another.

And besides, Max could use the calm time.

Or maybe that’s just what Maximus told herself.

She needed to know more about Mary.

As much as she could.

 

 


	2. Problem Child

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maximus meets Victoria.
> 
> Mary is nervous.
> 
> Maximus and Mary are dorks in the woods.
> 
> Mary is nervous.
> 
> Somethings don't need to be said.
> 
> Only felt.

The end of summer is a time a change for a lot of reasons.

Quietly, Maximus walked up the steps of the entrance to the Chase mansion.

The doors felt far too large for knocking to be effectual, and there wasn’t a door bell ringer in sight.

Oh well.

She knocked anyway.

The maw of the mansion split open almost immediately to reveal Mary, smiling as always.

“You’re on time.”

Maximus exhaled, amused.

“Is that unusual?”

Mary’s smile just widened wordlessly.

Maximus quietly rolled her eyes and walked through the opened door.

As Mary closed it, it groaned and creaked an uncomfortable sound of age.

The sound of it closing fully was awfully isolating, somehow.

Maybe from the way it reverberated along the large room she was in now.

Mary paused.

“Where’s Max?”

Maximus sighed and closed her eyes.

She deflated a bit, unconsciously.

Still, her posture remained with her hands behind her back, even if she was without her suit this time.

“I’m not allowed to go somewhere without her?”

Mary half-closed her eyes and crossed her arms, looking mighty smug all of the sudden.

Maximus just groaned,

“She’s not here.”

Mary rolled her eyes.

“Obviously, you dork. Where is she?”

Maximus turned to face Mary and shrugged.

“She’s only here every other year for the summer.”

Mary blinked a few times.

Her posture shifted, with her arms uncrossing to just rest uneasily by her sides.

Her face’s expression noticeably dampened, and she looked down to the floor for a few seconds.

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

Maximus said it like a sigh.

Mary looked up.

“That must be hard on you.”

Maximus fidgeted for a bit.

She brought her hands from behind her back to cross in front of herself instead.

“It’s …”

She looked away, trying to find the right word,

“… different.”

Mary raised an eyebrow.

“Different?”

Maximus nodded.

“It’s weird going home knowing that two little shit heads won’t be bothering me the entire time.”

Mary laughed gently, and her posture eased up considerably.

Her arms crossed again and she smiled more widely.

“You sound so heartbroken.”

Maximus smiled herself, gently.

But it wasn’t a topic she felt very comfortable discussing.

So after that brief shared moment of a smile, she cleared her throat and steeled her face.

“Anyway. I didn’t come over to talk about my woes.”

Mary nodded, and turned around. She started walking towards some stairs leading up to another floor.

Maximus followed behind her, shoving her hands thoughtlessly into her jean pockets.

“No, of course not, but ---“

Mary looked behind to Maximus as they walked,

“--- You know you can tell me this stuff. I’m not going to judge you.”

Maximus bit her lip, and looked away from Mary.

Anywhere else but to that gentle face beaming in such a caring manner.

“Awww, I made you blush.”

Maximus sputtered inconsolably and shot her look back, more harsh,

“Did not!”

Mary just laughed and laughed again.

She seemed so at ease with the world.

She looked ahead as they finished climbing the stairs, but hesitated on opening a set of doors there.

She turned around to face Maximus fully, and folded her hands together in front of herself.

“But, seriously. You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to. My sister is …”

Mary paused and pursed her lips, her expression becoming more thoughtful as she scanned for a word,

“… difficult.”

Maximus shrugged and closed her eyes for a moment.

“That’s alright. I’ll just to know avoid her if we don’t get along.”

Mary smiled again and went silent, looking down at the floor.

When she looked back up she unclasped her hands if only to smack them together again in a clap, up by her chest.

“Okay. That works.”

She turned around, opened the door, and started walking to the hall way.

“Just … don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

Maximus grunted flatly and continued to follow.

“You don’t think too highly of your sister.”

Mary sighed deeply, as though she were suddenly exhausted, and raised a hand up to rub at her temples.

They didn’t stop walking, though.

“I think the world of my sister.”

Quiet.

“But?”

Mary frowned and stopped in her tracks to face Maximus again.

“But…”

She looked away, breathed in deep, and exhaled slowly.

“I don’t know.”

She looked back to Maximus.

“She doesn’t have very many friends and just … she acts out a lot.”

Maximus raised an eyebrow.

“Acts out?”

Mary nodded slowly and raised a hand to rub at the back of her neck for a few seconds.

“Acts out, like … last week the family therapist quit after Victoria kept putting laxatives in every drink we gave to her.”

Maximus’ stern expression suddenly cracked, and she couldn’t help but laugh.

Mary raised a hand to shield her eyes, embarrassed, but she was smiling despite it.

In the brief moments that followed, Maximus was conflicted.

She wanted to reassure Mary as Mary had done to her not a few moments ago.

But the idea was … odd and a little concerning.

It was one thing for others to expose themselves emotionally to her.

It was another thing entirely for her to return the favor.

So she said nothing.

It was the easiest thing to do.

 

Quiet.

Eventually, Mary lowered her hand, and her blush calmed down.

“I um… Sorry - I don’t know why I told you that - It’s personal family stuff --- _Anyway_ \---“

Her voice was hurried and a bit too gentle for her.

_Damnit._

Silence was the wrong move.

They continued walking, only now the quiet between them felt off-putting and uncomfortable.

_Say something._

Maximus simply rattled off the first thing that came to mind,

“It’s um. Alright. It’s kind of … cute, when you talk about your sister.”

That didn’t _feel_ like the right thing to say, but Mary breathed a happy sigh afterwards.

So maybe it was alright.

The silence certainly felt less awkward now.

Mary stopped, suddenly, and nodded towards the door she stopped next to.

“Here we are.”

Maximus wasn’t nervous.

Victoria couldn’t be that bad.

\---

Someone was knocking on Victoria’s door.

How unreasonable was it that she just have _one_ day on her _weekend_ of all things where she could just be alone?

Victoria groaned and turned around on her seat to look towards her door.

“ _What_.”

Quiet.

“It’s Mary.”

Victoria sighed.

At least it wasn’t her father coming around to complain about something.

Mary this. Mary that. Blah blah.

“It’s open.”

The door opened and Victoria very nearly turned around again to focus on her computer, but.

Her eyes caught the glimpse of someone else in her door frame and she froze.

One of Mary’s friends?

Didn’t look like it.

This new girl looked almost out of place in the mansion.

A backwards baseball cap, loose fitting jeans and a plaid shirt.

Flannel, maybe.

Victoria’s face pitched up in disdain but she quickly hid it and kept her face flat and unfeeling.

“What.”

She didn’t care if she was caught staring at this point, since this new face was unusual, and she was allowed to stare at unusual.

“Victoria. This is Maximus. My good friend.”

Despite her pleasant peace-keeping tone the two had already been intently staring at one another for a few seconds.

If nothing else, this new face knew how to look fierce.

“Yeah? She always look like a butch _dyke_?”

Mary frowned, but Maximus scoffed, amused.

Mary wasn’t expecting that kind of reaction, and looked intently at Maximus.

“You’re going to get on me about how _I_ look with that hair cut?”

“I ---“

_Damnit._

Victoria had recently started to take to wearing her hair almost as short as she could without her parents killing her for it.

She wasn’t sure how much of it was in protest to Mary’s own much longer hair.

But, still.

This new face, Maximus, wasn’t like Mary’s other friends.

She could hold her own in mean banter.

Victoria just rolled her eyes and leaned back in her seat, finally looking away from Maximus to Mary again.

“And here I thought all of your friends were boring basic bitches.”

Mary broke her gaze from looking at Maximus to look back at Victoria, and opened her mouth to say something, but ---

“They are. That’s why I’m around. Keep things interesting.”

Victoria closed her eyes and laughed briefly.

She leaned back further in her seat and uncrossed her arms.

Well.

This was unexpected.

Before she could help herself,

“This one’s fun. Keep her around.”

Mary closed her eyes and breathed a sigh of relief.

Quiet.

“Anyway. We’re met, now. You showed your freak of a sister to your friend. Off with you.”

Victoria pitched up her voice and spoke harshly, derisively.

Her sister was always so easy to play for reactions.

Like right now, she’d act offended or annoyed, and patiently reiterate that _no you’re not a freak_.

But things were different with Maximus around.

“Freaks are good.”

Maximus’ words unbalanced both Mary and Victoria.

They both looked at her, but Maximus remained resolute and sharp.

Curious stares didn’t bother her in the slightest.

Quiet.

Then,

Maximus turned to face Mary.

“Where’s the bathroom?”

Mary blinked.

“Um,”

She leaned outside of Victoria’s room and pointed down the hall.

“There, last door on the left.”

Off Maximus went, but her influence remained long after she’d left.

Victoria was still just … processing.

Mary had dragged in someone who genuinely didn’t take her shit and knew how to bounce back.

When Mary saw that Maximus was out of ear shot, she quietly closed the door to Victoria’s room and walked in a bit more, to sit on her bed.

Quiet.

“You don’t have to be mean to people.”

Victoria blinked, and looked to her sister.

“I’m not being mean. I’m being honest and straight-forward.”

Mary frowned, and then sighed and raised a hand to rub at her temples.

Victoria mocked the gesture in the short while she knew Mary couldn’t see it.

So predictable.

“Besides. She’s … alright.”

Mary looked up at the words and lowered both of her hands to clasp them together.

“She’s alright?”

Victoria nodded.

“I like someone with an attitude that knows how to carry themselves. And if that rubs off on you, then, well …”

Victoria smiled.

“All the better.”

Mary laughed at this, perhaps at ease for the first time since she’d came into the room.

“I’m glad you like her.”

Quiet.

Victoria’s expression softened, as did her tone.

“This is the art bitch you were talking about, right?”

Softened a _little bit_ , anyway.

Mary rolled her eyes but nodded.

“Yeah. The one dad hand-picked for the program next year.”

Victoria closed her eyes and sighed.

“The one you have a crush on.”

They both went quiet.

Mary looked down to the floor, before back up to her sister.

She was smiling gently, despite the blush.

But her eyes were so vulnerable, gently dancing with an unspoken anxiety that Victoria was all-too familiar with.

“Is it that obvious?”

Victoria scoffed and looked off to her door.

“ _Oh Victoria_ \--- you won’t believe – I met this wonderful girl who had this handsome suit and she had a baby sister who was just so adorable and ---“

She pitched up her voice again in a terribly unflattering imitation of Mary.

Mary giggled but shook her head.

“—Oh stop it.”

Victoria was smiling, though.

Mary was, too.

Victoria looked back to her sister.

“She’s all you’ve been taking pictures of lately, isn’t she?”

Mary scoffed and crossed her arms.

“ _No_.”

Victoria half closed her eyes and her smile became a wry grin.

But she remained quiet.

“What?”

Mary sounded a little annoyed.

Victoria canted her head slightly and just kept looking at her sister.

Mary groaned and looked up to the ceiling, before back down again.

“Okay, fine --- _yes_. Just … don’t tell father, please?”

 Victoria grunted flatly and melted back into her chair.

“Screw him.”

Mary laughed again, but knew this was an improper thing to laugh at, and she really shouldn’t be encouraging that behavior out of her sister.

She calmed herself down.

“But I’m … serious. It means a lot to me that you approve of her.”

Victoria went quiet at this, and her playful expression died down.

She looked back off to her door.

Not that there was anything of interest to see there.

It always felt a little awkward when her sister was like … this.

When she acted like she genuinely cared about Victoria and about what she thought and felt.

Victoria didn’t really know how to handle it.

So she did nothing.

Thankfully, she didn’t have to do anything.

The door she’d been staring at opened, and Maximus came in.

Without knocking.

Mary stood up immediately and returned to her side.

“Anyway, um. We’re going to the forest to take some pictures. Text me if you need anything.”

The forest.

All alone.

Victoria smiled wryly and Mary looked off and away, unable to meet her sister’s gaze.

“Sure thing.”

They turned and left, and Maximus didn’t offer her some bullshit ‘nice to meet you’ nicety.

Good.

Maybe her being mean was a good thing if it selected out the people in Mary’s life who couldn’t deal with Victoria.

Mary was too nice, sometimes.

She needed someone who could be self-serving to balance her out.

Victoria sighed and turned back around to go back to her computer.

This was more than enough excitement for one afternoon.

 

\---

 

There wasn’t a lot that made Mary anxious.

She’d successfully navigated almost every aspect of her life with pride.

And yet …

Just thinking about how easily Victoria had pieced together her crush made her unreasonably so.

Did Maximus know?

Was it fair to keep her, of all people, in the dark about this?

For a while now – months, even – she’d been able to successfully convince herself that it wasn’t really a crush.

Maximus was just a child prodigy.

Of course Mary would be impressed by her.

Of course Mary would have a deep interest in her.

But there were these … moments.

Quiet moments when neither of them were talking, or even doing much at all.

Mary would get a thought.

And those too would make her anxious.

 

A particularly large twig snapped under her feet.

It distracted her from her thoughts, and she breathed in sharply.

“You sure there’s something out here? I just see trees.”

Mary collected herself briefly before smiling again.

She looked back to Maximus as they continued to walk.

“Yes. It’s wonderful. You’ll love it.”

Maximus did that _thing_ again.

She exhaled, amused.

The faintest corners of her mouth curved upwards.

Her eyes lidded gently.

With her hands still shoved into her pockets, she looked so at ease.

And earning these small little laughs and amused snorts were always so satisfying.

Mary looked forward again, lest she be thought to be staring.

“Victoria likes you, by the way.”

Maximus hummed thoughtfully.

“Wonderful. I was waiting with bated breath for her approval.”

Her snark was so genuine and so automatic.

Mary could help but laugh in response.

Quiet.

“It’s just… you know, nice. Like how Max likes me.”

Quiet.

“We probably wouldn’t even be here right now if Max didn’t like you.”

Mary bit the bottom of her lip.

That day by the reflecting pool felt so long ago, now.

“Yeah. So … it’s nice to not have to worry about her putting laxatives in your drinks.”

This got a proper laugh out of Maximus.

Mary too shared with the laugh.

“I dunno. I think I’m still going to have you taste-test my drinks first.”

Mary nearly jumped at another particularly fearsome twig snapping under her feet.

She looked back.

“Don’t I get a say in this?”

Maximus pursed her lips and hummed thoughtfully again.

Then, she just smiled.

“Nah.”

Even rarer than her laughs or her amused expressions were smiles.

Maximus reminded her of her sister a lot.

Only like a more tolerable version of her.

They had the same quality of being rewarding to interact with, if only to see past the calculated façade and see the real emotional person underneath.

Maximus’ eyes suddenly widened, and her mouth gaped.

“Woah.”

Mary blinked, before realizing they’d probably arrived.

She’d been too busy staring to notice.

Looking forward again, she smiled pleasantly and took a few steps further.

 

They were in a clearing.

Almost perfectly circular, and unbelievably serene.

A few felled logs crisscrossed seemingly randomly along the field.

In the center, a large boulder.

“It’s …”

Maximus had this breathy, airless quality to her voice when she was truly impressed.

Mary giggled.

“… so beautiful.”

Mary walked slowly to give time for Maximus to catch up.

After she had,

“This is where you wanted to take pictures?”

Mary nodded and sat down on one of the logs.

Maximus sat down right next to her.

Close enough that Mary had no choice but to smell her.

She steered her thoughts away from processing that too much.

“U-um. Yeah. This is it.”

She kind of hated how uneven her voice came out.

She shook her head and tried to focus.

When she looked back, Maximus had an eyebrow raised.

Mary just smiled, and turned around to point at the boulder.

“On there, specifically. I want to get a shot of you standing confidently on it, being eclipsed by the sun.”

Maximus’ gaze followed Mary’s indications.

She hummed approvingly.

“That sounds like a good shot. Make sure to get down low to the floor so you can get a low angle on me.”

Mary rolled her eyes.

“Duh.”

She pulled her camera up from its shoulder sling and began to fiddle with the settings to work with the amount of light in the area.

Maximus just exhaled, amused again.

“Go on. I’ll be right behind you.”

Maximus breathed in deep and stood up from the felled log.

As indicated, Mary got up right behind her.

They walked quietly towards the boulder.

So quietly, in fact, Mary had another one of those moments.

She looked up from her camera to see Maximus’ back.

If she did know about the crush, then it hadn’t really changed their relationship at all.

Did she even want it to?

It’d almost be irresponsible.

There’s no way her father would approve of the relationship.

It wouldn’t be fair to potentially jeopardize Maximus’ spot in their family’s art program just because of her stupid feelings.

Maximus carefully climbed up the boulder and stretched out, cracking her neck and various other joints.

“What kind of pose?”

_Focus._

Mary shrugged and breathed in sharply, but not that Maximus could see it.

“Improvise.”

She did _actually_ have a pose she wanted Maximus to take, but forgot about it.

Just a side effect of that damn moment.

While Maximus was getting ‘into character’, Mary backed off from the boulder slightly and got down onto the grass.

The lower she was, the more extreme the angle could be, the more dynamic the shot would look.

There.

_Click._

Mary shifted.

_Click. Click click._

She sighed contently, and comfortably fiddled with her camera’s settings.

_Click. Clickclick. Click._

“I got an idea for another shot.”

Mary raised her head above the viewfinder of her camera.

“Yeah?”

Maximus turned around, properly eclipsed by the sun.

But Mary could still see her grin.

“Imma sit down and be The Thinker.”

Mary giggled and smiled helplessly wide.

“That’s so dorky …”

Maximus’ face faltered for a just a second at Mary’s words.

But she wasn’t done.

“I love it.”

They shared a smile as Maximus sat down on the boulder and did her best _Thinker_ impersonation.

Mary took another shot from the same low angle, but wasn’t happy with the eclipsing effect of the sun anymore.

She stood up instead, and walked around Maximus, getting a variety of shots from a wide variety of angles.

She looked pretty dorky too, contorting her body around in odd ways to get the frame _just so_.

But it was okay.

There was no one around to see them being huge art dorks.

 

Eventually,

Mary sat down on the rock next to Maximus.

She offered her camera, and they went through the photos together.

It was so quiet.

She could hear Maximus gently breathing.

And see her smile unguarded, unashamed.

Mary had another one of those moments.

She bit the bottom of her own lip.

_Kiss her._

“I like this one.”

Mary blinked and refocused, turning her attention back to the camera.

She liked the shot, too.

In it, Maximus was flexing in an obvious an exaggerated manner.

In a way, it reminded her of _Atlas._

“I do too …”

Maximus gasped gently suddenly, and Mary could feel her exhale on one of her ears.

_Not helping._

“I just had a great idea.”

Mary smiled and looked in the same direction Maximus was.

“Yeah?”

Maximus stood up and started walking towards the tree she’d been looking at.

Mary followed, quietly, automatically, thoughtlessly.

“You have lots of shots of me – but I don’t have any of you.”

Maximus looked back with a wry smile.

Mary laughed gently.

“I don’t take good pictures of myself.”

Maximus just rolled her eyes.

“That’s why you’re not taking the picture.”

Maximus stopped, and Mary almost accidentally ran into her.

Maximus turned around.

She was still smiling, so earnestly.

She reached out a hand, stopping it half way towards Mary’s camera.

Mary slowly removed her camera from her shoulder and offered it.

She didn’t release it when Maximus grasped it, though.

Instead, she got close.

Closer.

Close still.

“It’s, um.”

_Focus you big idiot._

Mary breathed in deep,

“It’s back-button focus. You press this button here …”

She used her other hand to point at one of the many bewildering buttons on the back of the camera,

“… and it’ll focus, then you can press the trigger as many times as you want without it refocusing on every pull.”

She then pulled away and stood a few steps in front of Maximus, her hands clasped in front of her.

“Noted.”

Maximus spared no time in turning the camera over until she found a particular switch.

Of course.

Of course she liked manual focus.

“Where do you um, want me?”

Maximus looked up from the camera and nodded towards a nearby tree.

“There. Sit down in front of it and look casual, yeah? I like candid shots.”

Mary smiled.

“I do too.”

Of course they both did.

Mary shook her head and walked to the tree.

She breathed in calmly before sitting down in front of it as instructed.

She tried to make herself comfortable.

To make it easier, she didn’t even look at Maximus.

She wasn’t going to look at Maximus.

No.

This was candid shooting.

She couldn’t be posing or acknowledging the photographer.

She couldn’t ---

She looked.

_Click._

Maximus grunted.

“No good. You were looking.”

Mary quickly shuffled her gaze away.

_Sorry. I just like looking at you._

The words were right there.

But she decided against them.

Best to just let the moment go.

_Ugggh, focus. Stop being so useless._

It was frustrating.

She’d never been so anxious before – and she didn’t even fully know _why._

But she breathed in deeply, calmly again, and tried to zone out by looking at her surroundings.

Maximus wanted these shots.

The least she could do was try.

 

Later, the sun was starting to set.

The forest was adjacent to her house and Maximus was staying the night, so there was no rush.

They both sat down in the shade of some tree on the periphery of the clearing.

The camera was between them, shared with both sets of hands.

Mary had genuinely lost track of just how long they’d been sitting and standing here, taking pictures of one another and quietly reviewing each other’s techniques and shots.

When they reached the last shot – numbered something in the 200s by the camera –

She had another one of those moments.

They both sat perfectly still and just ---

Breathed.

No words, no actions.

Calmly resting against the tree and one another.

After what felt like an eternity, Mary gently tugged her camera free of Maximus’ hands, powered it off, and capped off the lens.

They didn’t require any words for this.

After she hooked the strap back onto her shoulder, she sighed contently.

“I had fun.”

It almost felt pointless to say.

It’s not like this was the first afternoon they had spent together.

Maximus made a thoughtful sound, and looked away to the yellow sky.

“You don’t have to lie on my behalf. I could see you were anxious all day.”

Mary blushed – _damn it all, she noticed –_ and hurriedly rushed her brain for something.

“No no no – it’s not – you’re not – I mean –“

It definitely _was_ Maximus making her anxious but it wasn’t like it was a bad thing?

Mary didn’t have the words to describe this.

Maximus grunted, and looked back to her.

She closed her eyes and breathed in deep.

She was quiet for an agonizingly long period of time, before,

“You know … you can …”

Maximus looked away before back again,

“Ugh – you can-tell-me-anything. Y’know. It’s fine. Really.”

Quiet.

Mary couldn’t stop her genuine smile at this.

Maximus couldn’t help but to reciprocate.

Mary noticed the careful intentionality in word choice.

In reusing what she had earlier.

She rested her head on Maximus’ shoulder and just breathed out.

Slumped.

Drained herself of all her worries and insecurities and woes.

This was going to _actually_ kill her if she didn’t get it off of her chest.

Maximus sighed pleasantly with her.

They both looked to the still-setting sun.

“I really like you.”

For some reason, it didn’t come out uneven, anxious, or nervous.

It was a little quiet, but the moment itself was necessarily so.

Quiet.

“I really like you, too.”

Maximus’ response was similarly free of troubles.

Thoughtlessly, Mary entangled one of her hands with one of Maximus’.

And for a while longer yet, they just watched the sun go down.

And the sky peacefully fade from a golden glow to a comforting inky darkness.

 

Eventually, Mary righted her head from Maximus’ shoulder, and kissed at her cheek.

Maximus made a flat unapproving grunting sound and Mary _almost_ had the time to react negatively –

But Maximus could move surprisingly fast and decisively when she wanted to –

Maximus snapped her head to looking at Mary –

She broke her hand free from its entanglement –

She held Mary’s face between both of her hands –

And they kissed.

Properly.

Quietly.

Gently.

It wasn’t electric or exciting or intensifying or ---

Mary felt more at ease than anything else.

More comfortable.

All the anxiety she’d been not-so-subtly stewing in evaporated instantly.

They held the kiss for longer than necessary.

And when they broke apart, they looked at each other for longer than necessary, too.

Maximus’ hands fell down slowly, carefully, to intertwine with Mary’s again.

Mary rested her head back on Maximus’ shoulder and they went back to staring at the sky.

“I’ve wanted to do that for a while.”

Mary’s voice sounded surprisingly scratchy and distant.

Maximus exhaled, amused.

“I know.”

Mary blushed, somehow even more than she was already, and hid her face in Maximus’ neck.

It was embarrassing to think she’d been stewing for no good reason.

But it was okay if it meant she’d have more peaceful, dorky afternoons like this.

Anything was worth this.

 

Summer was a time of change for a lot of reasons.

School was going to start again soon.

Mary’s life was more complicated with her increasingly close relationship to Maximus.

But it was okay.

Anything was worth this.


	3. Growing Up & Growing Out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Victoria makes a deal.
> 
> Max plays a song.
> 
> Chloe clutches her father's camera. 
> 
> One way or another, it's all going to change next year.

Mary looked at the message she’d received from her sister.

Reading the text a hundred times didn’t make it any easier.

_I’m out of here next year._

She frowned, slightly.

Next year?

Victoria would start high school next year.

That was an odd time to –

“What’s up, babe?”

Zim’s voice had this adorable concerned air to it.

Mary smiled unconsciously and looked up from her phone.

Her girlfriend had been laying down on Mary’s bed, in Mary’s room, in the Chase house.

Mary exhaled uneasily and shook her head with her eyes closed.

“Got a message from Victoria. She says she’s ‘out of here’, next year.”

Zim made that amused snorting-scoffing sound again and breezily looked up to the ceiling.

She was quiet for a while.

“Do you want to talk to her about it?”

Mary shook her head again with an eyeroll.

“No. I mean, yes, but, _she_ won’t want to talk to _me._ ”

Zim looked back to her girlfriend and stood up from the bed.

“She’ll talk to you if I’m around.”

Mary pursed her lips for a few moments before nodding and standing up herself with a small sigh.

It was weird – but in a good kind of way – how effortlessly her girlfriend had inserted herself into her family life like this.

“Yeah, probably.”

Mary smiled.

“Alright. Let’s go see her.”

Zim smiled as well for all a second or two before turning on her heel and walking towards the door.

But Mary quickly closed the gap between them to hug at her from behind.

Tightly.

Mary rested her head on her girlfriend’s back and breathed out slowly.

Zim never contested these moments; she’d just stop and raise her hands to gently pet or hold the arms that had come around to her front.

Public affections were still mostly verboten, to avoid Mary’s father from finding out.

They found ways to compromise.

Even if it meant being a little late to places they had to be, sometimes.

It was okay.

Anything was worth this.

\---

Another set of knocking on Victoria’s door.

“Ye ---“

Victoria didn’t even have the time to finish the vocalization before the door opened.

She sighed wearily and turned around on her computer chair again.

She knew who it was already from that intrusion.

“Rude. Hasn’t Mary taught you any manners yet?”

Victoria was right, of course.

Maximus and Mary.

By her door frame.

Maximus invited herself onto Victoria’s bed.

Mary sheepishly followed her lead after closing the door behind them.

Maximus soon scoffed and crossed her arms.

“Dunno. Has she taught _you_ any yet?”

Victoria hummed flatly and looked away from the two.

Quiet.

 

She looked back.

“What do you want?”

As predictable as ever, Mary had that look of surprise on her face.

Victoria thought she was being obvious in only respecting people when they didn’t take her shit.

It was frustrating that Mary never learned.

Mary  _had_ to learn this.

She couldn't just keep on being a goodie-two-shoes her entire life.

Still, Maximus looked to Mary.

Mary then shook the surprise off of her face and sighed.

“The text you sent me.”

Victoria crossed her arms.

“What about.”

Mary crossed her arms as well.

Maximus uncrossed hers to place her hands on the edge of the bed.

“I ---“

“--- Stop it. You know what we want to know.”

Victoria kept a smile off of her face, with some effort anyway, and looked to Maximus, before back to Mary.

“Of course. But not with you –“

She looked back to Maximus,

“- in the room. It’s family matters.”

Maximus raised an eyebrow.

Neither of them protested, though, so Victoria continued,

“Mary her. Then you can know all of the wonderfully juicy details about the Chase family you want to.”

Victoria couldn’t keep the grin off of her face anymore.

Maximus rolled her eyes.

Mary blushed viciously.

Maximus patted at her own thighs, stood up, and shoved her hands in her pockets.

“Give it a year or two.”

Maximus seemed to always know what to say to unbalance them both.

It wasn't especially surprising, but it was still odd to hear her affections voiced so nonchalantly. 

She got up and quietly left the room.

Quiet.

 

Victoria looked from the door back to Mary.

Mary had been looking away, blushing even more severely at her girlfriend’s cavalier attitude.

After a deep sigh, she looked to Victoria.

“It’s with dad, isn’t it?”

Victoria frowned before she could help it.

“Of course it is. When is it not?”

Mary just slowly shook her head and carefully laid down on Victoria’s bed.

“Alright. Hit me.”

Victoria looked off to her door again.

A year or two ago, she would have told her sister to shove it.

But.

 

She meant well.

“He called me into his study.”

\---

Mr. Chase cleared his throat.

Victoria shifted on her feet.

She looked anywhere but to him for a short while.

He looked anywhere but to her for the same while.

Mr. Chase poured himself a drink.

Victoria could hear the ice cubes clink quietly.

After he took a drink, he sighed and put it down.

Victoria looked to her father.

“So … you didn’t get into Helmsworth.”

Victoria crossed her arms and shook her head.

“Is that a surprise to you?”

Mr. Chase closed his eyes, sighed again, and took another drink.

He finished it, and slammed the empty glass container down on the small table that sat between him and another adjacent seat.

When he looked up again, he brought his hands up, resting his elbows on the armrests of his seat and interlocking his fingers near his chest.

“No.”

Victoria flinched, but.

It didn’t really hurt anymore.

Her father didn’t even sound disappointed.

Maybe he was bled dry of the ability to, by now.

Mr. Chase looked to the table next to him again, and broke one of his hands free to grab a small folded-up flyer that had been resting there.

“Here. Take this.”

He looked back to his daughter and offered the flyer.

 

After some considerable delay, Victoria inched closer and took the flyer from her father.

_Blackwell Academy._

She frowned.

Out of state.

She looked up from it ---

“I know you want independence.”

There was … something, in her father’s voice.

She couldn’t quite figure out the emotion.

Mr. Chase was an emotionless stone when he wanted to be, so hearing any emotion at all was exceptional.

“And I’m willing to give this --- _you_ \--- a chance.”

He poured himself another drink.

Victoria looked down to the flyer, and kept her frown.

“It’s out of state.”

Mr. Chase grunted flatly.

He finished pouring and held the drink in his hand, idly.

“It is. You’ll live in your own dorm, away from all of this.”

He raised his glass to his mouth,

“It’s what you’ve wanted since day one, anyway.”

That should have hurt too, but it didn’t.

If anything, Victoria was quietly excited about the proposition.

She was expecting an earful for not achieving something her sister had --- _again_.

But this wasn’t that conversation.

Her father had a contingency plan.

She looked up from the flyer.

_Arcadia Bay._

“It’s in some small hick town, isn’t it? That’s the catch to all of this? Hide me somewhere I can’t embarrass you?”

Her tone was derisive, but it often was, anyway.

Mr. Chase scoffed and put his drink down.

He folded his hands together again by his chest.

“Blackwell is known across the country; I’m not sending you to some apish public school.”

He looked down, away from his daughter.

Quiet.

 

She considered his words.

He looked back up.

“The catch is that I expect you to perform.”

Victoria evened out her expression to mirror his.

Lifeless.

This was transactional.

“As in?”

Mr. Chase took another hit of his drink.

“Straight A. Honor role. Dean’s list if they have it.”

She considered his words as he finished his drink and slammed it down again.

“This is your chance to prove yourself, Victoria.”

Was it possible to impress her father, yet?

After all of this time?

And all of the expectations heretofore not met?

She looked down to the flyer again and ran her fingers along it.

Her voice came out quieter than she was expecting it.

“And if I fail?”

Mr. Chase grunted flatly again.

“You’re not going to.”

She raised an eyebrow up and looked back up to her father.

Was that a threat?

Or encouragement?

His expressions were so slight and his tone so bare it was hard to tell.

Mr. Chase sighed and looked down again.

Quiet.

 

When he looked up, his face was softer.

As his words were.

“Listen, Victoria, I know we haven’t always seen eye-to-eye.”

Victoria shifted on her feet.

This was going to get awkward real fast.

“But I know you can do this. You’re a Chase, after all.”

So it was encouragement.

As best as her father could manage, evidently.

“Think it over – but quickly. The school year is starting soon.”

Victoria nodded, and turned on her heel to leave.

“And ---“

She blinked and looked back to her father again,

“--- take off that damn shirt. You look like a boy in it.”

Victoria scoffed, rolled her eyes, and left her father’s study.

People respected Maximus when she dressed like this.

It was more about not looking like Mary than anything else, anyway.

Her father didn’t need to understand that.

And Mary wouldn’t hear this part of the story.

 

One way or another, it was all going to change next year.

Victoria wasn’t sure if she was ready.

\---

Max carefully scrunched up on her bed.

The whole family had since moved to Seattle, to follow Maximus and her mother’s vision.

Even with a fresh start, Max still didn’t fit in.

She never understand the ease to which Maximus found herself entangled with another woman, or the ease to which Maxine found meaningful connections.

She was never bullied, per se.

Maxine usually knew how to apply grease to a situation to get Max out of it, no matter how impossible it seemed to Max.

Failing that, Maximus was a huge stone of a woman, and took poorly to news of her baby sister being threatened.

But Max never really fit in, still.

Maybe it was the constant influence her sisters had to exert that made all her social interactions just that much more awkward.

Maybe no one wanted to get that close to her for fear of annoying Maximus.

Maybe they all just thought it better to talk to Maxine instead.

She’d probably know how to handle whatever they needed better, anyway.

Whatever it was, Max was isolated socially.

 

She spent her free time in her room.

Practicing on the guitar that Maximus used to own.

In a shirt she’d used to wear.

Playing song she used to like.

Perhaps it was pathetic, but Max never thought of it like that.

Maximus was single most impressive human being she’d ever known.

She knew so many languages.

She could play at least four instruments _well_ and who knows how many casually.

She was as comfortable critiquing late post-modern art from a feminist as she was a Freudian perspective.

She already had a long-term, committed girlfriend.

And they’d probably already had sex.

She wasn’t even working yet and she was already generating the family income, with her shared contributions to Mary’s work.

And that was basically accidental.

Who knew what she could do when she wasn’t in school, and it was just her to put her mind to some impossible goal to achieve?

Maximus could solve world hunger if she put her mind to it.

Max believed it earnestly, with all her heart.

If there was any way to improve her station or her lot in life, it’d be through emulating Maximus.

It was a tall order to fill.

But, genetically, she had the best possible chance of doing it.

 

A sour note from her guitar resonated harshly in her room.

She sighed wearily.

Max still had a long way to go.

And she was already quite short of where her sister was, at this point in her life.

She slumped back down on her bed and put the guitar down, covering her eyes with one of her hands.

She could just …

“Hey.”

Max blinked her eyes open and peeled her hand away.

She knew that voice perfectly well, and compelled her body into standing and running towards the source of it.

She stuffed her face in Maximus’ chest and wrapped her arms tightly around with a deep, comfortable sigh.

“Hi.”

Sometimes she knew this affection was offputtingly forward.

Or something.

It’d take a few moments for Maximus to process it and know exactly just how to respond.

But when she felt one of Maximus’ hands pat consolingly at her back, she knew she’d made no mistake.

Quiet.

 

“Why’d you stop?”

Max blinked, again.

She carefully looked up from her head’s nest on Maximus’ chest to peer at her thoughtfully.

“H-huh?”

Maximus’ expression was slightly troubled.

She nodded towards Max’s bed and the guitar.

“Why’d you stop?”

Max followed her sister’s gaze and indications and sighed again, this time more wearily.

“I’m no good. I was just wasting time.”

Maximus scoffed.

Max blinked.

“No, you were doing fine.”

With some effort, Maximus peeled Max away from her death-gripped hug, and guided her back to the bed.

Maximus picked the guitar up, but hesitated on handing it over.

“You’re still playing on this old thing.”

There was a certain kind of breathless distance to her voice that Max didn’t know how to process.

So she just nodded.

“It still sounds good.”

Maximus was quiet for a few moments after that, just looking down at the guitar.

She soon smiled softly and pushed the guitar back into Max’s hands.

Max sat back down on her bed and accepted it.

Maximus’ hands went back into her pockets, their natural habitat.

“Do you know that Jose Gonzales song? _Crosses_ , I think?”

Max smiled, too.

“Kind of. I-I mean it won’t sound as good as when you do it but ---“

“--- play it.”

Maximus didn’t give her much time to wallow in self-doubt.

She just looked around and tried to find a place where she could sit.

There was nothing afar, so she just sat down right next to Max instead.

“I want to hear it before I go.”

 

_Oh._

Max couldn’t help but dampen her own expression.

_Right._

 

Max learned there was little use in trying to convince her sister to stay.

Mary was just too important to her.

The college was just too far away.

The dorms were just too cheap and convenient.

Still.

Max breathed in carefully and closed her eyes, and tried to clear her mind of all of that stuff.

And just.

Play.

Like it was the only song she knew.

Like it was the only song either of them knew.

Like it was the only song that ever existed.

Like this moment could last forever.

Just gently playing her guitar, while her sister watched, and smiled.

Sometimes Max didn’t feel that great when she played.

Maybe the notes would come out off-color and her music lame, disjointed.

It’d wear down on her sense of self-worth and what she was spending her free time on.

But.

 

Sometimes she felt great.

Sometimes everything flowed just right, and all the notes spoke harmoniously with one another.

She could forget who she was in those moments.

Fade into her surroundings, and just.

Play.

 

Like it was the only song she knew.

Like this moment could last forever.

Maximus wasn’t always going to be around.

That just meant Max had to make the most of what time was left.

If she was ever going to be one tenth of the woman her sister was.

 

Max eventually finished her performance.

Maximus had such a look on her face.

So content.

They just looked at one another.

They didn’t need words.

Suddenly, Mary clapped politely from the door frame.

Max hadn’t even realized she was watching – or even in their house.

Max just smiled sheepishly herself and put her guitar back down.

She did look up when Maximus got up to walk to Mary, though.

She always liked the stillness around them when they embraced.

It was so quiet, in fact ---

_Click._

\--- it was easy to hear a snoop.

Maximus grunted flatly, broke away from Mary, and chased after the snoop.

Maxine.

Maxine immediately bolted after getting her photographic evidence.

_Thump._

Quiet.

“Mooo _oo_ oom! Zim is bullying me again!”

_Thump._

Quiet.

“Am not.”

Quiet.

 

Mary looked concerned.

Max giggled thoughtlessly.

“Don’t worry –“

Mary looked to Max,

“- They do that a lot.”

They shared a smile.

 

One way or another, it was all going to change next year.

Max was anxious just thinking about it.

\---

Chloe never felt so exhausted before in her life.

She was pretty sure this is actually what it felt like to die.

“C’mon slow poke. We got another mile to go.”

Fucking running.

The worst form of physical exercise.

With a pained and inconsolable groan, Chloe stood up straight and tried to catch back up with her sister.

“Not _everyone_ is training to be a goddamn marine, y’know.”

Chloe’s sister, Liz, stopped in her tracks and grinned deviously.

She flexed her arms on either side of her body and looked towards one of her biceps.

“Maybe they should be.”

Chloe just rolled her eyes, caught up to her sister, and promptly sped past her.

Liz laughed and promptly started to run again.

This wasn’t a race, and there were no winners or losers, but she still wasn’t going to lose.

Especially not a slow poke like Chloe.

 

After they finished their agonizing miles-long run, Chloe collapsed indelicately on the steps leading up into her house.

It hurt her ass to fall on them like that but she couldn’t care less at this point.

The _only_ positive to running so much was the feeling afterwards.

Not the exhaustion that came with it, but the odd tingly sensation of oxygen-deprived body parts.

Liz hardly even seemed phased by the run.

“How many times do we have to do this before you stop sucking?”

Chloe grumbled, but needed time to catch her breath enough to respond,

“I hate running. It wasn’t easy when dad tried to get me to do it, either.”

Liz stiffened unconsciously, and her expression sobered.

It usually wasn’t good when Chloe talked about dad.

But it was a fleeting reference, and Chloe was nothing if not easily distracted.

Liz got another devious idea and exchanged her expression for a grin.

She extended her hand out to help her sister up.

“C’mon. I’ll make us bacon.”

Chloe gasped and shot her face up to look towards Liz’, for some signal of deception.

Seeing none, she gleefully took the offered hand, and stood up with her sister.

And was promptly hugged so tightly she damn near choked to death.

“Liz … can’t …”

What was even _worse_ about this was Liz was built like a tank and seemingly oblivious to her strength.

She must have had a foot on Chloe in height.

And her favorite past time was to pick up her rail-skinny baby sister in these hugs.

A most dreadful of bear hugs.

But when her sister put her down, Chloe didn’t recoil away or attempt to snake free.

She did _breathe_ heavily now that she was able to again, but.

Her head was buried in her sister’s chest, and she always enjoyed relaxing in the warmth of her sister’s grip like this.

There weren’t many people in Chloe’s life she’d agree to go running with.

There were even fewer that could hug her, like this.

There was only one that could do both.

Ever since dad enlisted, anyway.

But Chloe didn’t want to think about that now.

So she didn’t.

 

After entirely too long, the two separated and headed inside their house.

For almost every other human being on the earth, early weekend mornings were reserved for sleeping in.

It seemed like Liz was the only person to enjoy being up and at it.

But so early was also the only time she was unburdened with school or any other of her obligations.

So Chloe was always up with her.

Chloe sat down on the family’s dinner table and peered into the kitchen.

She pointedly ignored a clock showing that it wasn’t even 8am yet.

She had no business being up so early, really.

But that bacon smelled so good.

And Liz’ smile was so genuine.

The bacon was quick enough to cook.

In short order, Liz sat down at the table with her sister.

Chloe’s plate had more food on it, despite her being smaller, skinnier, and younger.

Chloe could eat food for days and not put on a pound.

Or get full.

Liz could hardly understand it.

She ate more slowly than Chloe.

In general, and particular to now, too.

When she had eaten one slice to Chloe’s three, she sighed and sat back in her seat some.

Chloe raised an eyebrow and looked in Liz’ direction, but wasn’t about to stop eating.

“Mom wanted me to tell you something.”

Chloe shrugged and shoved two whole slices in her mouth.

Yet somehow she still managed to smile.

“Rrrrhhr ---“

“--- don’t!”

Liz couldn’t help but to laugh gently.

She shook her head,

“Finish eating, then use your words.”

Chloe rolled her eyes, but obliged.

She swallowed so intently Liz knew she hadn’t finished chewing all of that.

“What’s the skinny? Can’t be good if you’re acting all mopey about it.”

Liz looked away briefly, before back to her sister.

Quiet.

 

“I’m definitely going to enlist after high school.”

Chloe went quiet.

Liz could watch her expression fall with a painful slowness.

Chloe looked at her food, but didn’t eat.

Liz bit her lip.

“With rot-see and all I’ll probably end up as like … a sergeant in a year. Hella quick promotions.”

Chloe raised a hand up to rub off the grease on her face and stood up from the table.

“Chloe …”

Chloe walked right past her sister, not looking back to her once.

“Chloe.”

Her sister tried again, but Chloe kept on walking.

“ _Chloe._ ”

With a pained, deliberate sigh, Chloe looked back to her sister.

“Just … promise me something?”

Liz blinked.

She stood up from the table and crossed her arms.

“What?”

Chloe closed her eyes.

“Promise me you’ll find him if you get deployed.”

Quiet.

So quiet.

The kind of quiet where the entire world felt stilled.

Liz slacked her shoulders unconsciously.

She closed her eyes as well.

“I’ll find him.”

When she opened her eyes, Chloe was smiling gently, but looking down at the floor.

“Killer. Mom’s given up … but I know …”

Chloe’s voice had already been so fragile earlier, but now threatened tears.

Liz bit her lip again.

It was so heart-breaking to hear her sister like this.

Especially when Liz could _see_ her _straining_ to stay composed and coherent.

“Dad’s still out there.”

Liz nodded, and breathed in carefully.

“I’ll find him.”

Chloe sighed contently and started to walk up the stairs of the house to her room.

“Where are you going? Bacon’s still here.”

Chloe didn’t even slow down.

“I’m not hungry.”

Liz flinched.

Somehow, that hurt even more than when her sister’s voice was raw and feeling.

There was only one other time she remembered her sister not being hungry.

Liz sat back down at the dinner table and just.

Slouched.

She wasn’t really hungry anymore, either.

\---

The closer a betrayal was, the more intensely it hurt.

Chloe was stupid.

So stupid.

So innocent.

So naïve.

Of course her sister wanted to enlist.

Of course she ---

Who cares about Chloe.

The thoughts were dangerous but intoxicating.

They were like an inconsolable blanket she wrapped herself in.

To isolate her from the soothing tones of her sister trying to comfort her.

She couldn’t help anymore.

Maybe no one could.

 

The next morning, Chloe didn’t get up early to run with Liz.

She didn’t get up at all until far too late in the morning.

And only after her hand was forced from a knocking to her room’s door.

“What.”

Quiet.

“It’s your mom, sweetie.”

Chloe sighed, but gripped the blanket surrounding her more tightly.

Both the literal and metaphorical one.

“Come in, I guess. Or whatever.”

The door opened.

Her mother sat down pleasantly across the bunkbed Chloe had fortified herself in.

Quiet.

“Are y’all okay? Liz sounded worried last night.”

Chloe grumbled incoherently.

Quiet.

“I guess she told you, then.”

Chloe grunted an affirmation.

Her mother sighed.

Quiet.

“You still have a few weeks with her left. Is this how you want to spend it?”

Chloe grumbled some more.

“You know she doesn’t _mean_ to upset you. It’s just ---“

Chloe snapped the blanket down and away from her body.

Her mother stilled.

There must have been something severe on Chloe’s face since her mother’s expression became somber just witnessing it.

“--- No one _means_ to do anything. No one cares. No one listens.”

Her mother bit her lip, looked down to the floor, before standing up and resuming eye contact.

This wasn’t a new conversation, and she’d made no progress on getting through to Chloe.

The last time went particularly sour, so she was hesitant in pushing her daughter too hard.

Still.

“I listen, when you actually tell me what’s bugging you. So does Liz.”

Chloe frowned and looked away from her mother.

“Then listen to me now. Go away. I don’t want to talk.”

Her mother flinched.

She smiled, but her mouth was trembling slightly.

She closed her eyes.

“Okay.”

The word was so soft.

She turned and walked out of the room.

“I’ve got to go to work. You can always talk to me when you need to.”

Chloe grunted again.

Her mother always need to be at work.

When the door was closed and Chloe was finally left in peace, she melted back into her bed.

She fell asleep again.

 

Chloe woke up with a gentle gasp.

Her body felt stiff and sore.

Her room was bathed in oranges and yellows, and for a little while she couldn’t tell if it was early morning, or late afternoon.

After replaying the day’s events, she decided it had to be late afternoon.

She wasn’t sure about it, though.

She carefully got up from her bed and walked over to her room’s window, just to confirm.

It probably wouldn’t have any bearing on if she went back to bed, but it was going to bother her if she didn’t know for sure.

She opened the blinds and ---

She hissed and immediately raised a hand to shield her eyes, reflexively looking away.

The sun was bright and her eyes were not adjusting well.

When she opened her eyes again, she noticed some things on her desk that weren’t there before.

Her dad’s old camera, a brochure, and a hand-written note.

Liz was a fastidious cleaner.

There’s no way that was there this morning.

After a few more seconds of processing, Chloe slanted the blinds to her window about halfway – assured in the knowledge that it was late afternoon – and picked up the note.

_Chloe,_

_Your father wanted you to have his camera. He was so proud of you and your artistic abilities._

_Blackwell is the perfect place for budding young artists. I wish I could have told him you were going there in person, to see the look on his face._

_It would have been **priceless**. (Get it? That was your dad’s favorite joke.)_

_Don’t worry about the cost._

_I know you can do it if you try._

_Love,_

_Mom_

Chloe put the note down, welded her eyes closed, and looked up to her ceiling.

Thoughtlessly, she brought the camera up to her face, and sniffed.

It didn’t smell of him anymore.

Perhaps a year, perhaps a month too long for it to be preserved.

Eventually, she looked back down to her desk.

She brought the brochure up to reading distance while keeping the camera hugged tightly to her chest.

It certainly seemed like too smart and haughty of a school for a dumb kid like her.

Probably full of rich assholes who never knew what it was like to grow up with a single mother.

Chloe frowned and almost crumbled the brochure from that thought alone.

But …

If it was what her father wanted …

She sighed.

She put the brochure down, and looked to her father’s camera.

She could at least think about it.

She laid back down on the bed, with the camera nearby.

 

But she didn’t sleep.

She tossed, and turned, groaned, complained, but ---

Eventually, she looked to the camera again, and picked it back up.

Fine.

The first picture that stupid camera took after years of inaction was Chloe, in her bed, looking god-knows how miserable and tired.

But it was still a picture.

That Chloe took.

She fell asleep, laying on her back, with the camera on her belly.

 

One way or another, it was all going to change next year.

Chloe wasn’t ready.

She never was.


	4. Light

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Victoria meets Mr. Jefferson.
> 
> Some bitch talks down to Chloe.
> 
> Nathan drops a bag full of money.
> 
> Rachel considers pushing someone.

It was quiet.

Victoria had moved the last of her boxes into her new dorm room.

At Blackwell Academy.

She’d been laying on her bed, just staring up at the ceiling of her room, thinking.

So quiet.

It was still a week or so before classes would begin.

She really ought to be unpacking, but.

The boxes mostly just had clothes, anyway.

She didn’t need a change of clothes, right now.

Thoughtlessly, she pulled out her phone to check it from messages.

Not from Mary, or her family, or anything like that.

Just in general.

Nothing.

She frowned, then sighed, and got up from her bed.

Might as well take a stroll around campus to see what her life was going to be for the next few months.

 

Her first stop was Mr. Jefferson’s office.

He was a well-known photographer with a certain style that impressed Victoria.

Moreover, he probably had connections.

Those could be useful.

She knocked on his door.

“Come in.”

She carefully opened the door and closed it behind her.

Mr. Jefferson was seated at his desk, going through some papers.

He looked up only when the door was closed.

His face scrunched up for a few seconds, then softened, as his eyes widened.

“Ah!”

Victoria blinked, but sat down on one of the seats in front of his desk.

“Mr. Jefferson? I’m ---“

He put his papers down and turned his chair to face Victoria directly.

He smiled broadly,

“--- One of the Chase family, I know. You’re a spitting image of Mary.”

A lesser soul would have been unable to resist the compulsive disgust.

But Victoria was better than that.

She kept her face pleasant and her tone warm, despite growing enmity at the comparison.

She did _not_ look like Mary.

Victoria spent considerable effort ensuring that.

“Yes, that’s right. Mary is my sister. I’m Victoria.”

Mr. Jefferson nodded breezily and kept smiling.

“That’s wonderful. Your sister is a real treat. It’s always interesting when someone half your age can hold their own in a conversation you’ve spent your whole life studying.”

Victoria smiled politely.

“The Chase family prides itself on our knowledge of the arts.”

Mr. Jefferson laughed gently.

So did Victoria.

It didn’t _sound_ forced or polite or fake, but it certainly was all three.

“Well, this is quite a surprise. I take it you’re going to be in one of my classes?”

Victoria made the expression on her face more neutral.

“I …”

That was her plan originally, but the idea of being constantly compared to her sister for an entire semester was quickly becoming unpalatable.

“I don’t know. I’m still undecided on what classes I’m going to take.”

Mr. Jefferson’s expression fell neutral as well as he considered her words.

“Well, you better decide quickly,”

He chuckled quietly,

“Classes are starting soon. I’m not sure there’s going to be a lot of open slots left.”

Victoria nodded.

“I’m actually heading to my councilor’s office right after this. I just wanted to know what your class would be like.”

Mr. Jefferson smiled again.

“Ah-ha. Productive. Well,”

He looked down to his papers, studying them for just a second or two,

“You’re a freshman, I take it, so you’d be in the introductory course.”

He looked back up,

“That might be condescendingly easy for you. It’s mostly history and some theory.”

Victoria nodded politely.

“But ---“

Victoria blinked.

“--- I’m sure you would still get something out of the class. You could …”

Mr. Jefferson hummed flatly,

“… meet more young, nubile women in the class. Network, you know.”

Victoria laughed gently.

“It won’t do me a lot of good to have a bunch of unknown photography friends.”

She pursed her lips, suddenly, thinking she may have overstepped herself.

But Mr. Jefferson just laughed earnestly and shook his head.

“Nonsense. I got my first gig from a friend, you know.”

Mr. Jefferson closed his eyes and breathed out contently.

“And I’m sure there will be a lot of people clamoring to know the sister of the famous young prodigy.”

Like Victoria needed to be reminded of that.

Still, she smiled, and stood up.

“Well, that’s all I needed from you, Mr. Jefferson. I wouldn’t want to take too much of your time.”

He laughed again and stood up with her.

“Don’t worry about it! You can always come to talk to me about anything. I always have time for students of the art world.”

Victoria chuckled quietly.

“You’re too kind. It was nice meeting you.”

He just smiled more broadly, crossed his arms, and nodded.

“Likewise. I hope to see you in my classes soon. I’m _dying_ to see what you can capture with that artist’s eye of yours.”

Victoria turned to leave his office, but stilled when the door opened.

Victoria wasn’t the one opening it.

Instead,

Another young woman.

Victoria sized her up _immediately_.

Long, straight hair.

Proud, confident posture.

Warm, almost bubbly smile.

Bigger boobs.

The woman didn’t miss a beat in looking to Victoria, following her eyes, and whisking one of her fingers up.

It twirled around before pointing up to her own face.

_Shit._

Did Victoria really just get caught staring?

Victoria huffed, crossed her arms, and looked off to one of the walls.

She kept the woman in her periphery though.

The woman’s smile became a wry smirk, and she looked sidelong to Victoria before walking her way to Jefferson’s desk.

“Mark. I hope I’m not interrupting … ?”

Victoria turned around to face Mr. Jefferson --- Mark? --- and the woman’s backside.

“Rachel …”

Mr. Jefferson’s tone was a little dangerous and bouncy.

He tapped his hands along his arms.

The woman --- Rachel --- shifted her posture, and brought her hands behind to loosely hold them at the small of her back.

Mr. Jefferson looked back to Victoria,

“No. You’re not. Victoria here was just leaving.”

Rachel turned her head to look at Victoria as well,

“Victoria … ?”

Victoria sighed wearily, closed her eyes, and prepared for the worst.

“Chase.”

Of _course_ , Rachel gasped quietly.

When Victoria opened her eyes again, she damn near jumped out of her skin.

Rachel had gotten quite close and was positively beaming with effuse energy.

But Victoria was good at controlling her reactions to situations by now, so she remained composed and resolute.

“ _No_ _shit_? What’s a big-time name doing all of the way out in this little old town?”

Mr. Jefferson scoffed, amused, and shook his head.

“ _Rachel_! Blackwell Academy is a _prestigious_ school known all across the nation. I’m sure it was Mr. Chase’s first choice.”

Victoria kept her arms crossed and her lips pursed while she tried to figure out this Rachel’s game.

Mr. Jefferson looked to Victoria.

For her part, she just shrugged.

“Something like that.”

He looked back to Rachel.

Rachel smiled, but Victoria was quickly coming to see the way her lips curved up as a devious, deceiving feature, not a warm, genuine one.

“Of course, _Mr. Jefferson_.”

Rachel put such an odd amount of emphasis on Jefferson’s name.

Mr. Jefferson cleared his throat.

Victoria breathed in carefully.

“Anyway. As I was saying, it was nice meeting you all.”

Mr. Jefferson nodded.

Rachel continued to beam.

“Yes, yes, of course --- go on Victoria. Sorry for the disturbance.”

 _Disturbance_ indeed.

Victoria lingered at looking at Rachel for just another few moments, before turning and walking out of Jefferson’s office.

“I like your shirt, by the way. Very butch.”

Victoria let Rachel’s compliment go unaddressed and closed the door behind her not a moment too soon.

 

When it was closed, she crossed her arms tightly again and leaned against the nearby hallway.

She did _not_ like the way her first interaction with that woman --- Rachel --- went.

The greatest insult to Victoria was feeling like she didn’t have a commanding presence in the room.

Rachel was an insufferable, inescapably bright light, that demanded attention simply by sheer force of will.

She didn’t like the idea of such stiff competition.

Just one more reason to reconsider her place in Mr. Jefferson’s class.

A mix of that … _woman_ and Jefferson comparing her to her sister all semester long might actually be enough to make her scream.

But then she just sighed, pushed herself off the wall, and started walking.

But maybe she was over-reacting.

Maybe Rachel behaved more composed in a classroom setting.

Maybe Jefferson would respect her wishes to be considered an atomic piece, outside of Mary’s sphere of influence.

 

Victoria had hoped that being so far away from home would isolate her from her sister’s long shadow.

But it seemed that shadow was even longer than she imagined.

She decided to walk aimlessly around campus a bit more to think this through.

 

Victoria made her way outside to some common grounds.

Her face had been thoroughly consumed by a frown by now.

It was mostly one of concentration, though.

Victoria looked around.

There weren’t too many people out and about.

Really, just one person, by a statue near the middle of the grounds.

It was a woman.

She too had long, straight hair.

But she wasn’t dressed aptly for here.

Combat boots.

Military-grade cargo pants with an equally tacky camo print.

Olive wife beater.

If Victoria didn’t know any better, she’d say this woman was in some kind of military program.

Like this place had one of those.

She was fussing with ---

_Oh my god._

Victoria walked up to the woman before she could help it.

“Um, did you just walk out of the ‘70s with that fucking camera?”

Some part of Victoria chided herself, telling her she was being unnecessarily cruel.

But after the little encounter with Rachel, Victoria was feeling tense.

This was an unusually good way to relieve that stress.

The woman sighed, put her camera down on her lap, and looked up to Victoria.

Her movements were slow and intentional, but the bags under her eyes belied her fatigue.

“I don’t know.”

The woman’s words were quiet and drained.

Victoria almost felt bad, again.

This woman clearly had some weight on her shoulders.

“It must be. That’s the last time military wear was chic. That’s not even retro now.”

Victoria put her hands on either side of her hips.

The woman’s face pitched up in disgust.

Victoria smiled pleasantly.

“Do you have to be so mean? What did I to you?”

Victoria scoffed and rolled her eyes.

“As _if_. The world is full of mean people. You’re not going to get anywhere by acting all ‘ _woe is me’_ whenever you’re beset with difficulties.”

Victoria didn’t come here to proselytize her world philosophy, though.

Just as well, the woman was done listening.

She sighed severely and looked back down to her camera.

“Then I won’t get anywhere. Just … leave me alone.”

Victoria scoffed, but casually looked around.

She wasn’t acting this way to _just_ lick her wounds after her encounter with Rachel.

She had to a reputation to build.

But there was hardly even a fucking mouse around to witness this.

She got what she needed.

“Fine. Au revoir.”

The woman muttered something under her breath.

Victoria crossed her arms and walked away from the scene.

Feeling much … better.

That encounter with Rachel was a fluke.

Victoria was the one in charge of this school.

\---

“Fine. Au revoir.”

Of course the bitch spoke French.

She kind of had to, really.

Or maybe that was the only French she knew, and she sprinkled it in whenever she could to sound smarter.

After that witch of a woman walked away, Chloe sighed deeply again.

Coming here was a mistake.

She couldn’t even fucking sit outside peacefully without someone realizing how horribly out-of-place she was.

She still had a week or so.

Maybe she could call her mother up and tell her it just wasn’t working out.

Chloe raised a hand up to rub at the dog tags she’d been wearing.

Would her sister approve of her running away?

Would dad?

“Hey.”

Jesus Christ --- really?

Another one?

Chloe frowned and looked back up.

This is probably what she deserved for being outside instead of just moping in her room.

This woman looked different, though.

Unlike that witch who just cackled right on by with her broom stick and storm cloud, this woman was bright and sunny.

The witch’s smile was unnerving.

This woman’s smile was assuring.

“Um. Hi. Do you need something? I’m kind of … done talking for today.”

The woman laughed innocently and sat down next to Chloe – too close.

“You can’t be serious! It’s not even noon yet.”

Chloe huffed and looked away from the woman, off to the sky above them.

She scooted an inch or two away for good measure, too.

Quiet.

“I’m Rachel, by the way.”

Chloe looked back to the woman – Rachel – and down to a hand that she’d evidently extended in the intervening moments.

“You’re … not going to go away, are you?”

Rachel smiled brightly, ear-to-ear.

“Not until I know your name and you tell me what’s crawled up your ass and died.”

Chloe groaned.

Was this woman for real?

What a freaking mood whiplash this was.

Quiet.

Well.

At least she’d be quick to deal with, if that’s all she wanted.

Chloe shook the hand.

“I’m Chloe.”

Their hands fell down gently.

Chloe pursed her lips and thought of how to phrase this.

Rachel waited patiently, never breaking eye contact. 

“My sister just joined the marines.”

Chloe looked away again, and exhaled deeply.

“I’ve been thinking about it a lot, lately.”

Rachel reached a hand out and touched Chloe’s shoulder.

Chloe immediately stiffened up and shot her gaze to the offending hand.

Rachel broke the hand away and surrendered both of her hands up by her chest.

“Sorry.”

Chloe only just now realized how starved of physical affection she was.

It was so easy to just get a hug from her sister whenever she needed it.

She tried to relax herself and look back forward with another sigh.

“It’s alright. I just wasn’t expecting it. You can um …”

Chloe didn’t want to complete the thought.

Rachel put her hand back on Chloe’s shoulder, and it wasn’t electrifying this time.

More relaxing than anything else.

Chloe closed her eyes.

“I just worry about her. We used to spend every day together, and now … she’s …”

Chloe frowned, and didn’t want to complete the thought again.

“Is that what those dog tags are for?”

Rachel’s voice became so small and slight.

Chloe looked down to her chest and opened her eyes again.

She hadn’t even realized she’d ended up rubbing the dog tags with one of her hands again.

“Yeah. Kind of.”

Chloe scoffed and shook her head,

“It’s stupid. Just some ---“

Rachel’s hand gripped tightly at Chloe’s shoulder.

Chloe looked to her.

“--- It’s fine. You can tell me. I won’t judge you.”

Chloe bit her lip.

“These were my dad’s. My mother gave them to me before I came here.”

Rachel’s eyes widened.

She opened her mouth to say something, but nothing came out.

Maybe there was just nothing to say.

Chloe just watched the other woman’s expressions cycle.

If nothing else, her face journeys were entertaining.

Eventually,

“Man -- I feel like such an _asshole_ for being nosy. I’m so sorry – I can’t imagine what this is like for you.”

Chloe breathed out and looked away from Rachel again.

“Yeah.”

Quiet.

“Are you um, like, okay?”

Chloe laughed, and it felt good to laugh.

It’d been too long since she had last.

She looked back to Rachel.

“By your standards or mine?”

Rachel smiled softly.

“Yours, I guess.”

Chloe shrugged.

“I’m here. Putting one foot in front of the other. That’s good enough, I guess.”

Rachel’s smile faltered slightly, but she had the good sense to not let it show much.

It was her turn to sigh.

“Listen, ---”

Rachel looked down to Chloe’s lap, and slowly traced the hand that had been on Chloe’s shoulder to her hand.

Chloe blinked, and watched the hand descend, but didn’t object.

Rachel grasped at that hand, turned it round, and with her other hand, placed a piece of paper in it.

“--- I’ve got to go now. I’m a nosy little bastard but I _promise_ I’m better company than this most of the time.”

Chloe blinked.

“No it’s --- fine --- you’re --- fine.”

Chloe looked back up to Rachel, hoping her inelegance with words was somehow endearing.

Rachel’s smile just turned wry.

“Oh. Oh okay - that’s good.”

She pulled her hands away and stood up.

“See I was going to offer you free drinks in my room. Buuuuut if we’re already cool, then I’ll just be on my merry way.“

She started to walk away, and only paused a few steps off to look back with that wry grin.

“But suppose you want to impose on my hospitality or _something_ anyway, you have my number now.”

Chloe blinked again.

She didn’t drink – Liz was adamantly opposed to it – but she kind of wanted to spend more time with Rachel, now.

It didn’t help that what little interaction they just had reminded Chloe of just how starved she was.

“Maybe I’ll call you … or something.”

Rachel giggled.

“Hella rad. I’ll see you then.”

_Hella rad._

Chloe laughed quietly herself, and looked back down to the piece of paper in her hand.

This day was turning around, a little bit.

With any luck, that witch hadn’t put a hex on her or anything.

Those words, though.

_You’re not going to get anywhere by acting all ‘woe is me’._

Chloe ran her thumb over the paper for a little while.

She then pulled her phone out and added Rachel’s number into it.

Maybe some drinks would help her relax.

It’d certainly be better than sitting in her room all day long.

\---

A few weeks were nothing if you had something to look forward to.

Victoria relaxed contently in one of the many pools nearby.

It was rarely swimsuit weather so early in the year.

Global warming, or something.

Either way, when the day presented itself as being scorching hot, everyone knew there had to be a celebration of the warmth.

A pool party it was.

In an abandoned water park.

Perhaps ill-fated, if it weren’t for the enormous influence of the people who organized the event.

Perhaps it was luck.

Perhaps it was money.

Vortex Club parties were never shut down.

Not even with all of the underage drinking.

And drugs.

 

The club’s perennial leader, Nathan, suddenly got up out of the pool.

“Five-oh.”

Victoria looked around, but wasn’t too concerned.

Nathan had a bag by their pool just for such an occasion.

The rumors were that the family Nathan belonged to had an outsized influence on local politics, and especially the police.

Somehow, this was one of the times where rumors weren’t as lurid as the actual reality of the situation.

Victoria got up after him.

Whenever possible, she liked being around Nathan.

She was concerned about her image.

So was he.

But more than that, he projected the kind of image she wanted.

Even now, it was hard not to respect the sheer nerve he had in the face of potential consequence.

Hardly dressed, dripping wet, duffel bag situated on his shoulder, red solo cup, flawless hair, pristine designer sunglasses.

“My brother always used to say ‘anyone can be bought’.”

He kept his voice flat and even, and took another sip of his drink.

He looked back to his companion.

Victoria hummed contently.

“Just a matter of how much?”

Nathan chuckled quietly, and looked forward again.

“Exactly.”

Certainly a reassuring attitude when about to bribe police officers.

Victoria followed Nathan all the way to the entrance of the park.

She kept her arms crossed and put her sun glasses atop her head just so she could leer at anyone that looked in their direction.

Everyone here had to know how important she was.

 

The two stopped in front of two police officers in full uniform.

One of them was diligently writing down something on a notepad.

The other crossed his arms and looked at the interesting scene of two high school kids staring them down.

This is the one who spook first.

“Is that alcohol, kid?”

He nodded at Nathan’s drink.

Nathan nodded.

“Yeah.”

The officer’s face scrunched up.

 

Nathan finished off his drink.

The discarded carcass of his cup hit the floor loudly, pointedly crumpled up.

“How’s the family, Dan?”

The officer that had talked to them cleared his throat and looked away.

“They’re fine.”

His voice was appreciably quieter.

Victoria smiled pleasantly.

As did Nathan.

Nathan unhooked the duffle bag from his shoulder, and tossed it in front of the two officers.

Somewhere along the way the zipper came slightly undone.

The officer that was writing things down carefully closed his notepad.

The two officers looked in unison at the bag.

Then to one another.

Then back to the two kids.

“Is that money?”

Nathan’s smile just turned wry.

“Yeah. Seems I just lost about two thousand dollars.”

He inhaled deeply, closed his eyes, and exhaled pleasantly.

“But I hear that’s about enough to make the day of two woefully underpaid officers.”

The officer Nathan called Dan leaned over to pick up the duffle bag.

He looked inside.

The other officer looked dumbstruck.

“You’re not serious.”

Dan scoffed flatly, pulled out a stack of bills, and shoved it into his partner’s chest.

“What are you going to tell your family when the city cuts your pension again?”

The other officer looked down to the wad of money, and carefully took it.

“I …”

He went quiet.

Nathan kicked the crushed solo cup away.

Victoria still wasn’t too concerned, even with this officer’s hesitation.

Nathan said he’d done this quite a few times, now.

And his brother quite a few times before him.

“Fine, just … keep it down. We don’t want any more noise complaints.”

Nathan scoffed indignantly and rolled his eyes. 

“We’ll be as loud as we want, _thanks_.”

Dan hooked the duffle bag onto his shoulder, put his other arm around his partner’s shoulder, and started to walk away.

 

That felt _good._

Victoria sighed pleasantly.

“They need the money more than I do.”

Nathan muttered it, but Victoria giggled quietly.

Nathan just smiled briefly in her direction, before looking past her.

His expression died.

He crossed his arms.

“Ugh.”

Victoria followed Nathan’s gaze.

Her expression died.

She crossed her arms.

Rachel.

“Sycophant.”

If there was one thing Nathan and Victoria could relate to one another with, it was their wealth and reputation.

And how others sought to enrich themselves through it.

This, Victoria learned, is what bothered her so much about Rachel.

Even now, with her smile so wide and expression so earnest, she knew exactly what Rachel was going to say.

“You took care of those officers so easily. I’m impressed.”

She was talking to Nathan, but spared Victoria a sidelong glance for a few seconds.

Rachel had her own toady this time, though.

Victoria thought Rachel’s orbiter looked familiar, but couldn’t quite place it.

She’d probably just seen her in the halls, or something.

“What do you want, Rachel.”

Nathan didn’t sound impressed or amused.

Victoria tremendously respected that he didn’t let Rachel’s stunning beauty cloud his judgement.

Rachel frowned for a second or two, then just laughed quietly.

“You and your brother are such hardasses, jeez.”

Nathan shifted on his feet and uncrossed his arms.

He instead hooked his fingers along the waistband of his swimming trunks.

His expression was as thoughtlessly cold as Mr. Chase.

With any luck, it was as intimidating.

Rachel hesitated for a few more seconds, then sighed and crossed her own arms.

“I just want to have a good time here, y’know?”

Nathan rolled his eyes.

The words were confusing to Victoria, but.

“You know the going rate. Fork it over if you want your fun.”

Rachel frowned again.

Victoria only just now realized what they were talking about, and frowned herself.

Rachel did oblige him, though, and procured a clip of money from seemingly nowhere.

Not like swimsuits had a lot of pocket space.

Still, the flash of green made Nathan’s expression change considerably, and he happily took the offered clip.

He briefly ran his fingers along the edge of the bills to count.

“Perfect. Talk to Hayden. He’ll give you what you want.”

He looked up with a warm smile.

“Pleasure doing business with you.”

Rachel smiled politely, despite herself, and knowing full well Nathan’s smile wasn’t genuine.

“Yeah. Sure.”

Rachel and her friend left.

Victoria and Nathan started to walk towards their pool.

Victoria sighed.

Quiet.

 

Nathan looked her way.

“Do you have to sell drugs?”

Nathan scoffed and looked back forward.

“You need to learn to relax, Vic. You’re too stuck-up sometimes.”

Victoria bit her lip.

She trusted Nathan more than probably anyone else at this school.

But even then, that trust was skin-deep and founded on their shared distastes.

It wasn’t a strong foundation for a friendship.

Certainly not strong enough for her to divulge and work through her insecurities and anxieties with him.

“Fuck off. I’m perfect and you know it.”

He laughed pleasantly.

“That’s better.”

She grit her teeth.

Not that he could see it.

Or care.

Quiet.

 

They were about halfway to their pool.

“So you don’t like Rachel either.”

He looked back again with a softer expression on his face.

“My brother told me almost daily to not trust women. Buncha lairs and sluts. Some feminazi dykes in there for good measure, too.”

Victoria blinked.

Nathan saw her response, and shook his head.

“Not you, though; you’re different. Not like the other girls.”

He looked back forward.

Victoria didn’t know how to parse what he said.

He certainly didn’t say it like an insult.

But it didn’t feel like a compliment, either.

_Not like the other girls._

Maybe this was a side-effect of her conscious aversion to all things Mary.

She decided ‘not like the other girls’ was probably a good thing.

“She’s a typical woman, anyway. So slippery and two-faced.”

Victoria grit her teeth, again.

This was _so_ not a conversation she was interested in having.

Especially with someone she wanted to remain friends with.

Even if mostly for political reasons.

“I guess.”

Nathan laughed contently.

“See. You don’t get all offended for no fuckin’ reason. You’re different.”

Victoria _almost_ responded, but.

The pool was in front of them, again.

All of her friends were right there.

They all looked up to Nathan.

They all looked up to her.

So she just smiled.

“I guess I am different. I’m _perfect_.”

Nathan laughed again.

They both slid back into the pool.

Nathan carefully leaned over the edge and started counting money.

Victoria just tried to relax.

She tried not to think too hard about what Nathan said.

He was kind of an idiot, anyway.

Maybe if all women are liars, then all men are idiots.

Whatever.

She needed a drink.

\---

“Right here.”

Rachel beamed proudly, with her arms wide, presenting.

Chloe looked past her to what she was gesturing towards.

Justin and Trevor looked to one another.

“The old water park?”

Rachel turned around, still with her arms uplifted.

“Duh.”

It wasn’t very ‘duh’ to anyone else.

She sighed, and crossed her arms.

“No one will be here right now. All of the empty pools will be perfect for skating in.”

Chloe frowned wordlessly.

She had her skateboard up behind her head, with both of her arms lazily keeping it in place.

Justin and Trevor just shrugged.

“Whatever you say, Rach.”

Unlike Chloe, the two of them were very laid back and chill.

Even if they didn’t always agree with her, they didn’t have the presence of mind or will to directly contradict her.

They just went with the flow.

Chloe, however …

Justin and Trevor walked past Rachel and Chloe into the abandoned water park.

Chloe just continued to stare at something off in the distance.

Rachel frowned herself and pulled up close to her side.

“It’ll be fine.”

Chloe was quiet for a while.

“The cops came here last time.”

Rachel scoffed and rolled her eyes.

“That’s because the Vortex Club was throwing a party loud enough to hear from the moon.”

Chloe looked sidelong to her.

She then lowered her skateboard down to the floor and put one foot on the extreme end, to tilt it up.

“And we’re not alone. Someone’s on the slide.”

Rachel blinked, but Chloe didn’t feel like elaborating, and started skating mindlessly into the park.

She looked to where Chloe had.

She then frowned.

Someone _was_ on the slide.

Why would …?

 

Rachel took her own skateboard and rolled over to the stairs leading up the slide.

Chloe was waiting for here there.

Arms crossed and everything.

“Stop it.”

Rachel just smiled pleasantly.

She kicked up her skateboard and held it in a hand as she walked past Chloe and up the stairs.

“Stop what?”

Chloe groaned and sighed in an exaggerated manner.

“Stop snooping. That’s Victoria up there. She will actually not-at-all-kidding-in-the-fucking-slightest bite you if you get close.”

Rachel hummed pleasantly.

“Maybe I like that.”

Chloe put her hands on her face and dragged them down with considerable force.

“You comin’?”

Despite herself, Chloe followed after Rachel, grumbling the entire way.

“Seriously. I’m getting bad mojo from this. The hell is she doing here?”

Rachel shrugged.

“Why don’t we find out.”

Chloe put a hand on Rachel’s shoulder.

They paused and looked to one another.

“Can’t you just listen to me for once?”

Rachel huffed indignantly.

Chloe could be difficult to convince sometimes.

And did not hesitate throwing emotional punches when things didn’t go her way.

“I listen to you all of the time. _Relax._ Victoria doesn’t hate me.”

Chloe scrunched up her face.

Rachel just smiled, wormed her shoulder free, and continued up.

Chloe stopped, though.

“Besides. No one happy just sits in an abandoned park all alone.”

Chloe sighed.

“You don’t have to keep trying to make everyone happy.”

It was Rachel’s turn to frown and stop.

“I do.”

That was enough for Rachel.

She kept on walking up the stairs.

“Why ---“

“--- _Now_ who is snooping?”

Rachel was unusually short with Chloe about this.

She was hoping she could take a hint.

 

Thankfully, she did.

She followed silently up the rest of the steps.

It was a little windy up here.

There was a square platform before the slide.

Chloe wanted as much distance between her and Victoria, so she stood with her arms crossed by the stairs.

Rachel walked a bit closer.

Victoria remained sitting, looking away from the two of them, watching over the park.

Her knees were up by her chest, and her arms were around those.

Tightly hugging at herself.

“Victoria …?”

Quiet.

The wind whistled.

Some of the old wood of the platform creaked.

Rachel could hear her own breathing.

“What.”

Victoria didn’t sound right.

Upset, maybe.

Rachel kept her voice as quiet and gentle as possible.

“It’s kind of lonely up here.”

Victoria sighed.

“Yeah, that’s kind of the point.”

Rachel put her hands in her pockets.

“Do you like skating? You could use my board for a bit.”

Quiet.

Victoria looked back.

Her eyes were a little irritated, but none of her makeup was running.

“Look – we’re not friends --- can’t you just … ?”

Victoria’s eyes darted back to the stairs.

Rachel looked with her for a few moments.

Chloe was leaning off the guard rails by now, smoking and trying very diligently not to pay attention.

Rachel smiled, and looked back to Victoria.

“But I’m going to see you raining down storm clouds all over us. Bad vibes, yeah?”

Victoria’s face scrunched up and she looked forward again.

“Sorry that me feeling awful is an inconvenience to you, then.”

Rachel frowned.

Victoria had this habit of speaking tensely and derisively when she was being sarcastic.

Just in case anyone thought she was being serious, maybe.

“Final offer. Hour with my board and some weed to help you unwind.”

Victoria sighed wearily.

“Go away, Rachel. I’m done talking.”

Rachel frowned again.

Victoria was in something fierce of a mood.

She looked back to Chloe.

She’d finished with her smoke and was counting nails in the floor boards.

She looked up when she heard that the conversation might be over with, though.

Chloe nodded back to the stairs.

Rachel shook her head.

Chloe crossed her arms, canted her head off to the side, and rolled her eyes away in an exaggerated show of disapproval.

Rachel just smiled pleasantly and looked back to Victoria.

She looked down the slide.

It led to the only pool with water still in it.

Hmm …

No one was ever sad when sliding down a water slide, where they?

The floor boards creaked.

Rachel looked back.

Chloe was _right there_ , now, looking more annoyed than before.

“Don’t. Come on. We’re done.”

Victoria sighed pleasantly.

“Yes. Listen to your toady, Rachel. You’re done.”

Chloe didn’t even bother looking annoyed at Victoria since she was already so done with this situation as it was.

Rachel deflated and sighed herself.

“Fine, fine. Go on, Chloe. I’ll be right down after a smoke.”

Chloe frowned, and hesitated.

She took a good long look at Victoria, and pointedly looked back to Rachel.

Then she turned around and walked off the platform, down the steps to the water park.

Rachel walked to the edge of the platform and leaned off the railing.

The wood creaked again.

She took a hit of her cigarette and exhaled easily.

Quiet.

“Bottling shit up never helps.”

Quiet.

Victoria scoffed.

“Being a nosy little bitch never helps, either.”

Rachel just smiled.

She watched Chloe finish walking down the stairs and starting to skate, again.

“It helped Chloe.”

Victoria grunted flatly.

“Is that her name. I was so dying to know.”

Rachel took another hit.

“Yes, it is. And I’m so totally glad to help.”

Victoria groaned.

Rachel looked her way.

She could have sworn she was smiling slightly, even if she could only see the back of her head.

Quiet.

“Why are you so fucking happy all of the time?”

Rachel looked back down to the other skaters.

Quiet.

“I’m not.”

Rachel calmly exhaled another hit,

“There’s so much darkness in this world. Are you getting on my case for trying to add a little light to it?”

She’d lost her usual chipper tone by now.

Quiet.

Victoria squirmed and readjusted her seating.

She dangled her legs off the slide.

“No one just does that for no reason. That’s too much of a burden.”

Rachel smiled at this, at least.

She dropped her cigarette to the concrete below, since putting it out or letting it rest on wood seemed like a bad idea.

She turned around to face Victoria.

“You’re right. No one does that without a reason. Maybe someday you’ll be close enough to someone to know why they still try and make people less miserable. Why they still have hope for this world.”

Quiet.

Victoria sighed again.

“Just … go away, Rachel.”

Rachel turned around and started to walk towards the stairs.

“Yeah okay. I don’t go away for good, though. Nice chat, Vicky.”

Victoria groaned.

“You’re such a pain in the ass. It’s _Victoria._ ”

The wood underneath Rachel groaned again.

“Whoops, can’t hear you, Vicky. Wood’s too loud. Oh well.”

Victoria muttered something incoherent.

Still.

Rachel smiled.

She took this more as a win than a loss.

That was the most Victoria had talked to her in a long time.

 

Even the darkest of shadows can have light cast on them.

Cast some light, you’ll be alright.

For now.

She sighed.

If only she could teach Chloe that.

If only she could teach the world that.

 

Chloe was kind of pissy for the rest of the afternoon.

She wasn’t happy that Rachel ignored her to ‘waste time’ with Victoria.

She later got it in her head that they only went to the park so that Rachel could talk to Victoria.

Rachel wasn’t quite sure if the jealous, moody Chloe was an upgrade from the quiet, depressed one.

But.

 

There were these little moments.

Those little glimmers of light.

When Chloe smiled toothily or her eyes were bright.

When she could laugh.

When she could be happy.

 

They made it all worthwhile.


	5. Disorientation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Victoria runs from some asshole.
> 
> Max is somewhere she shouldn't be.
> 
> Max gossips.
> 
> Chloe stares at some rich bitches.

Max was anxious.

To say the least.

This was her first day at a new school.

At a town that was both new and old to her.

Old, because it was her home town.

New, because it had been several years since she was here last.

And this time gap was felt most clearly in how few people she recognized here.

Blackwell Academy.

 

Her older sister, Maxine, placed a hand on her shoulder and shook it.

“Still with me? You’re doing that thing again.”

Max sighed, closed her eyes, but nodded.

“Just thinking. I don’t know anyone here anymore.”

Max could feel her sister smiling even with her eyes closed since Maxine always smiled.

“Nonsense. We weren’t gone for that long. I’m sure you’ll find plenty of familiar faces.”

Max thought about this for a few seconds and looked up to her sister.

“You think so?”

Maxine was, of course, smiling, and nodded pleasantly.

“I know so. Look. We’ve barely even stepped foot on campus. Let’s keep going.”

Max nodded and looked forward.

“Okay.”

They did actually have to be somewhere.

Eventually.

They had time to kill, for now.

 

Max continued to think as they continued to walk and she continued to see a bunch of faces that continued to be new to her.

Despite her sister’s incessancy, it felt like she hadn’t recognized one face yet.

Maybe this is what she should have expected, anyway.

Her childhood friends weren’t really artists.

It’s not like Chloe or any of them would be here.

Most of her childhood friends probably couldn’t even afford to go here, even if they wanted to.

What a sobering reminder that was of how different she was, now.

Maybe she wouldn’t even recognize anyone she _did_ know.

Maybe they wouldn’t even recognize her.

Max wasn’t sure if she found the thought more comforting or disquieting.

She’d have to think on it some more.

“Wait-hey. _That’s_ someone you know.”

Max blinked and pulled herself away from her thoughts.

\---

Taylor noticed when Victoria went inexplicably quiet.

She noticed it especially because Victoria was not one to randomly stop speaking mid-sentence.

She peeled her attention up and away from the book she had been reading.

Victoria and her were situated under the shade of a tree.

And Victoria was frozen, incapable of processing what she was seeing.

Taylor just pursed her lips, though.

She didn’t see anything unusual.

“What. What’s going on.”

Taylor looked to Victoria and waved a hand in front of her face.

Victoria took a second, then frowned, crossed her arms, and stood up.

“Nothing. It’s nothing. Nothing is going on.”

Taylor rolled her eyes.

Victoria might as well have said ‘something very serious is going on’ with the severity of her disagreement.

Still, the ‘nothing’ that was going wrong was wrong enough to get Victoria to stand up and start walking away.

“Hey!”

And ignore Taylor’s calls.

Freaking … weird.

They were kind of in the middle of something.

Taylor just sighed intently, rubbed her face with a hand, and looked back down to her book.

Victoria could be difficult to work with, sometimes.

She looked back up from her book when she heard someone jogging closer.

It was one of the people she’d seen earlier, but that woman didn’t look unusual then.

Did Victoria … ?

The woman kept right on moving quickly past the tree and Taylor.

Taylor frowned, and watched her go off in the direction Victoria had.

“Hey! Victoria doesn’t like it when people chase after her.”

The woman kept on going, just raising a hand up to wave dismissively at the thought.

Taylor groaned.

Why did no one listen to her when she said this?

It was bad enough that Rachel thought she knew better.

Let alone some rando who didn’t even know anything.

Taylor really wasn’t looking forward to a pissy Victoria all afternoon.

They _did_ have work to do, after all.

 

Taylor looked up once more when she heard yet another set of footsteps approaching her.

\---

Max was pretty sure this couldn’t have possibly gone any worse.

Still.

She kind of needed to find her sister.

The thought of being alone, especially when orientation was approaching, was not an appealing thought.

This woman sitting under the tree must have seen where Maxine went off to.

They had interaction, after all.

“Um. Hey.”

The woman looked up, and her expression was briefly puzzled.

“Did you ah – see where my sister went?”

The woman blinked, and looked back behind the tree.

“Your sister? The one who blew me off? I think she went after my friend.”

The woman looked forward again and frowned.

“Please don’t follow her. My friend just hates it when people chase after her and if either of you put her in a bad mood ---“

Max raised her hands up in surrender.

The woman sighed.

“--- I’m not looking for Victoria. I just … want my sister, is all.”

The woman stiffened.

Her eyes narrowed and her head tilted slightly.

“You know Victoria?”

Max looked off into the distance and quietly rubbed at one of her shoulders.

“Kinda? She never really liked me and we never really talked.”

Max unconsciously crossed her arms,

“She looks so different now …”

She wasn’t sure why this of all things was spurring wistful nostalgia.

The woman emitted a flat grunting sound.

Max looked back to her as she stood up.

“She doesn’t like anyone. So that sounds about right. My name is Taylor, by the way. If you know Victoria you should probably know me.”

Max nodded carefully.

Taylor extended her hand, and Max took it to shake it.

“Tell you what. You tell me what Victoria used to be like, and I’ll help you find your sister.”

Max sighed in deep relief and smiled.

“Thank you so much.”

She then breathed in, and thought about it for a little bit.

Quiet.

“Um. She used to like … dress differently.”

Taylor hummed approvingly, and gestured behind her.

“Let’s walk and talk.”

Max nodded.

They started to walk.

Max didn’t really know all of what Taylor wanted to know, or more importantly, why.

“Her hair was a bit longer. I don’t think she wore as much makeup.”

Taylor hummed again.

Max looked down to the grass under their feet and tried to focus on it.

She kind of felt weird talking so much by herself.

Still, this was a means to an end.

Taylor didn’t seem yet satisfied, though.

Quiet.

“I don’t – I don’t really know what else you’d want to know.”

Taylor made another humming sound, but didn’t look back to Max as they continued to walk.

“Can you tell me what one of her usual outfits looked like?”

Max considered the question carefully.

She really couldn’t.

“Victoria wore different stuff every time I saw her. I just know she didn’t look like … that.”

Taylor looked back at this,

“Like what?”

Max shrugged,

“Like _that_. Um. Rich?”

Max had other words on her brain, but held them in case they might have offended Taylor.

Taylor just laughed and looked back forward.

“You mean preppy.”

Max thought about it for a few moments.

“I guess. I’m not caught up on fashion stuff.”

Taylor looked back again, and Max could see her eyes quickly scan what Max had on.

Her face was disbelieving, but short lived, as she looked back forward again.

“You look kind of preppy too, you know.”

Max sighed wearily and rubbed at one of her shoulders.

By now, they were in some hallways, so she looked at the texture of the walls.

“This was my sister’s idea.”

Taylor made a curious humming noise.

“Your sister has good ideas.”

She hesitated for a second,

“Except for chasing after Victoria.”

Max smiled gently at both the compliment and criticism.

She felt quite similarly.

Quiet.

\---

Victoria moved faster than it seemed like she was capable of moving.

Maxine frowned and stopped.

She crossed her arms and brought a hand up to support her chin.

Maybe she should just go back.

Max _was_ kind of waiting on her.

But Victoria just looked so troubled when she ran off, like that …

“Hey.”

Maxine hummed a wordless question to the source of the noise and turned to face it.

With a smile, of course.

The voice belonged to a woman she hadn’t seen before.

Only she was a bit shorter than Maxine, and effusively warm with her returned smile.

“You look like you’re looking for someone.”

Maxine nodded with a gentle sigh,

“Oh, hey there. Yeaaaaah. I was looking for this girl named Victoria --- “

The woman’s eyes lit up instantly,

“--- but she’s really fast sometimes, apparently.”

Maxine raised both of her hands on either side of her body,

“Lost the trail, I guess!”

The woman laughed easily and took a few steps closer.

Maxine didn’t mind in the slightest.

People could be however close they wanted to be so long as they gave her good vibes like that.

The woman then looked around for a few moments.

“She’s probably moping on the roof again.”

She looked back to Maxine.

There was a dangerous flash in her eyes.

“Do you know what set her off in the first place?”

Maxine shrugged.

“She just saw me and my sister and bolted.”

The woman blinked.

“Victoria is afraid of you two?”

Maxine pursed her lips, and thought about it.

“Maybe. Didn’t exactly get a chance to ask her nothin’, you know.”

The woman laughed again and just shook her head.

“That’s crazy. I know some people that’ll just die to know about this.”

She combed some of the hair away from her face with one of her hands.

“I’m Rachel, by the way.”

Maxine smiled.

\---

Taylor looked back again.

“So do you know why she did that?”

Max looked forward to Taylor and blinked,

“Who did what?”

Taylor shrugged,

“Either. Why Victoria ran or why your sister chased after her.”

Max went quiet.

Taylor looked back forward.

“I don’t think Victoria is very happy to see either of us. She only kind of tolerated my eldest sister.”

Max breathed in a weary breath,

“And Maxine, my other sister, just kind of does that. She’s disappeared for hours before.”

Taylor made that curious sound again.

“Sounds like quite a personality when you need her to be around.”

Max just shrugged.

It was kind of difficult to adjust to, compared to how her eldest sister acted prior.

Maxine was less a comfort blanket than Maximus.

But maybe Max needed something like that these days.

She couldn’t always be her eldest sister’s shadow.

Quiet.

 

Taylor came to a stop at a door.

She turned around to face Max, and crossed her arms.

“Okay so, if I know Victoria, and I do, she needs to unwind in spots way above everyone else. She’s like a cat, y’see.”

Max blinked.

Taylor smiled pleasantly and nodded behind her,

“This door leads to a stairwell to the roof.”

Max blinked again,

“Students are allowed on the roof?”

Taylor shrugged,

“Not really. But all of the locks have long since been busted, and it’s not like there’s security guards patrolling the stairwell.”

Max sighed and rubbed at her face with one of her hands.

Literally her first day and she was already thinking about doing things she wasn’t allowed to do.

The very thought just filled her with all kinds of anxiety.

Taylor soon brushed past her,

“Anyway, I have things to do, and I’m so not going to talk to Victoria right now. Hope you find your sister, though.”

 Max turned around, as though she was going to chase after Taylor,

“Hey …!”

But Taylor just looked back with a smile and kept on walking, until she turned a corner and was out of sight.

Max ran some fingers through her hair, turned around, and considered her options.

She _did_ really want to find her sister.

 

It took longer than it should have, but Max eventually guilted herself into opening the door to the stairwell and walking up the stairs.

\---

Victoria took another hit of her cigarette.

She was standing as she always did, with at least one arm crossed.

Trying to be an unmovable statue.

She looked down on the ants below from this vantage point.

It was reassuring, in a way.

There was no way they could bother her up here.

 

The door leading into this section of the roof opened.

Victoria sighed and tightened the fist that wasn’t holding her cigarette.

There was no way anyone could bother her up here, unless they were doggedly determined to annoy her.

Like ---

“I feel I’ve told you a thousand times _Maxine_ – I don’t ---“

She turned on her heel and blinked.

That wasn’t Maxine.

Close, though.

The mouse of a girl that was Maxine’s little sister.

Max.

Victoria frowned and let her sentence just die off awkwardly.

She looked off to the side and took another hit of her cigarette.

Out of the corner of her eye she could see Max just standing here, unsure of what to do or say.

Victoria rolled her eyes and exhaled a pointedly large amount of smoke before looking back.

“I was expecting your sister.”

Max finally took a step away from the door and nodded carefully.

“Um, so was I.”

Victoria emitted a flat grunting sound and gestured around her with her free hand,

“Clearly, she’s not here.”

Max looked around and sighed wearily.

“Yeah, I guess not.”

Quiet.

 

It was awkward.

Victoria wasn’t helping.

She was staring painfully harshly at Max the entire time.

Max shifted around under the gaze.

She was never was particularly good at dealing with it.

Eventually,

“You – smoke now?”

Victoria scoffed and rolled her eyes.

She looked to her cigarette,

“No, of _course_ not. I would _never_ do such a thing.”

She looked back to Max,

“Any more stupid questions?”

Max sighed again, looked down to the floor at her feet, and rubbed at her hair with a hand.

Quiet.

 

“It’s just --- weird. You never – you didn’t…”

Max looked up and removed her hand from her hair,

“I didn’t think you needed them.”

Victoria frowned.

Max blinked and her eyes widened a bit.

She opened her mouth to say something ---

It was too late, though, and Victoria just turned back around.

“Go away, Max.”

She took another hit of her cigarette,

“I don’t know where your sister is - but she’s not here. So shoo.”

Quiet.

 

After a little while, Victoria heard the door leading away open and close.

Good.

She was alone again.

As she should be.

But.

She looked to her cigarette.

She frowned more earnestly.

She didn’t _need_ it.

She could stop whenever she wanted to.

She looked back to all the ants and peasants below.

Max never knew anything.

She certainly didn’t know how to talk to Victoria.

 

\---

 

Max eventually regained the presence of mind to just check her damn phone.

She’d silenced it since she was going to be a good girl.

Who didn’t use her phone during school.

But that wasn’t going too swimmingly anymore.

Now that she had broken into the school’s roof, and gone where she wasn’t supposed to.

Still, it meant she found the twenty-or-so text messages from her sister.

Max was a bit more at ease as she made her way to orientation.

 

The rest of her morning was kind of a blur.

She remembered Maxine coming to hug her out of seemingly nowhere a few times.

Just to make sure she was still okay.

Max wasn’t that feeble.

But still.

It felt nice to know that her sisters cared about her.

Eventually, it was lunch time.

 

Max got her meal and sat down at a table.

All alone.

She felt like she needed a moment alone to recharge.

But this was naïve of her.

Seemingly out of nowhere again, Maxine materialized herself and sat down next to her baby sister.

Positively beaming, like always.

“Did you make any new friends, yet?”

Max shook her head slowly and finished chewing.

“Uh no, not really. I’ve barely even had time to think this morning.”

Maxine sighed contently.

“I know, isn’t it great?”

She took a bite of her own food, while Max studied her carefully.

Max had more in common with her eldest sister, Maximus.

Maxine might have been the only through-and-through extrovert in the entire family.

She had the longest hair.

She cared the most about fashion.

While she cared about creative work, as all Caulfields did, they were more like hobbies to her, instead of a career.

Max really wasn’t sure where the genes for Maxine’s personality came from.

When Maxine noticed Max was staring, she finished chewing, looked to Max, smiled broadly, and closed her eyes.

“Speaking of. I should tell you about who I met today …”

Max nodded, broke her gaze away, and resumed eating.

Communication with Maximus was mostly non-verbal.

They had gestures, physical affections, knowing looks.

Communication with Maxine was almost entirely verbal.

Max figured if she just listened to her enough, she could learn how to better talk to strangers and make friends.

Through osmosis, or something.

“So, right after Victoria took off, I met this ---“

The two of them paused, suddenly aware of another presence nearby.

They both looked and watched as a boy sat down on the table, across from them.

“--- Hey like – you’re the caulfields, right?”

Max looked to her sister.

Deferred, more like.

Maxine nodded.

“Oh, yeah. What’s good?”

The boy suddenly had a dangerous grin.

“I heard you scared Victoria.”

Max initially thought he was still talking to Maxine, but she could feel his gaze heavy on her, and slowly looked in his direction.

She blinked.

“Me? I --- Um.”

Maxine inelegantly but subtly shoved her shoulder.

This didn’t really help Max much, though.

Max didn’t think she could honestly characterize that as ‘having scared’ Victoria.

And she didn’t want to think about Victoria hearing that she had said that.

“Well?”

Oh – right.

She should say something.

Say something, Max.

“I guess. Kind of. Maybe.”

The boy gasped.

“No way! The Caulfields are even cooler than I thought!”

Max immediately felt guilty.

But she also liked the way this boy seemed to be pleased by her response.

Was this what making friends felt like?

He was grinning ear to ear.

Waiting on every word she had to say.

Maxine realized Max was getting lost in thought, again, and decided to step in.

“You wanna’ know more about Vicky? Victoria’s a lot of talk and no show. Trust me. I’ve known her for years.”

The boy nodded, but looked a bit skeptical.

Maxine was just getting started, though.

 

Max didn’t pay too much attention to the conversation after that.

She was too busy trying to figure out if she had done the right thing.

 

Eventually, the boy got up and left.

Maxine hummed, and looked to her sister.

“Look at you. Gossiping and everything.”

Max felt the hair stand up on the back of her neck.

“That wasn’t --- I didn’t … that wasn’t gossip, was it?”

Maxine laughed and laughed.

She took another bite of her food.

“Of course it was. I wouldn’t let it bother you too much, though. Nobody takes gossip too seriously.”

Max frowned.

“It doesn’t seem right, though. Victoria wasn’t afraid.”

Maxine just shrugged.

“She might as well have been. Did you see how fast she bolted?”

Max sighed.

She remembered that _look_ Victoria had on her face when she thought Maxine had followed her.

“She just didn’t want to talk to you.”

Maxine hesitated.

For the briefest of moments, Max thought she had broken her.

But then she just shook her head, and seemed to regain her composure.

“I’m sure it was something else. Victoria’s just a little hard to understand, sometimes.”

Max bit her lip.

She wasn’t about to get into an argument over her sister over the subject of understanding people.

Maxine was _probably_ right about this, anyway.

She usually was.

Maybe Max just didn’t really know what Victoria meant when she looked like that.

“Besides. Victoria’s a big girl. I’m sure she can take it.”

 

It was much later in the day when Max was putting things into her locker.

She noticed someone standing next to her.

She closed her locker.

Victoria.

Max blinked.

“Ah – Hi, Victoria. What are ---“

Victoria huffed and narrowed her eyes.

Max went dead quiet.

“—You know perfectly well what I’m here for.”

Max blinked again.

She thought about it for a few moments, then feebly shook her head.

“No, really, I-I, I was just putting stuff in my locker and I’ve ---“

Victoria groaned in such a loud and pained way, like Max had just punched her in the gut or something.

“--- You’ve been fucking gossiping about me.”

Max quickly looked around, but mostly because she felt her cheeks burning in intense embarrassment and wanted to make sure this wasn’t going to become a scene.

Victoria wasn’t controlling her volume.

“No, I – That’s not – I didn’t – I didn’t _mean_ \---“

Max often felt that talking to Victoria was like walking in a mine field.

Right now was no exception.

At that last word, Victoria’s gaze became even more intense, and she righteously shook her head again.

Max went quiet again.

“I don’t fucking care what you _meant_ to do, asshole. Just stop it. You fucking know I’m not scared of either of you.”

Max looked down to the floor.

Victoria sounded angry, but.

Also a little hurt.

Max wasn’t entirely sure – she second guessed most of what she assumed out of social interactions these days but –

It sure sounded like it to her.

And it made her feel tremendously guilty.

Was it worth making some friends if she threw people she knew under the bus like that?

“Okay.”

It didn’t feel like it, right now.

Victoria stiffened.

Max looked up to her, and couldn’t quite parse the expression on her face.

Was she not expecting Max to just comply like that?

She sure was putting on an awful lot of intimidation otherwise.

Still she ---

Max stopped processing everything as someone inexplicably shoved her up against the lockers.

“Nathan … !”

Victoria just about gasped it.

Max saw this --- Nathan? --- some boy with a hard-set jaw and pristine hair.

It was hard to think about much at all right now, though.

He was so close.

He looked so _mad_.

Max felt overwhelmed and couldn’t move – not just because he was literally pinning her to the lockers, either.

“This the bitch?”

His voice was low, growled, directed at Victoria.

It made Max shiver.

Victoria sighed and raised a hand to rub at her temples.

“Yes, but, we worked it out with those weird things called _words._ ”

Nathan sniffed, looked to Victoria, back to Max, and scoffed.

He pushed her up a bit higher.

Max squeaked.

He then let her down and crossed his arms.

He didn’t get much farther away, though.

In fact, he leaned in closer, until his nose was very nearly touching Max’s face.

“Don’t _fuck_ with my girl. Any of ‘em. Got it?”

“I ---“

Nathan suddenly jolted upright and shot his gaze back.

A hand had ended up on his shoulder.

Not that it was terribly surprising at this point to Max, but it was Maxine’s.

She had an almost supernatural talent for knowing when Max was in some kind of trouble like this.

Though she was a bit late, this time.

Still, beggars couldn’t be choosers, and Max was no less happy to see her this time.

She finally managed to fucking _breathe_ , anyway.

 

Nathan backed off from Max and looked to Maxine.

Victoria did, too.

She had that _look_ again.

“The fuck do you want?”

Maxine smiled and hummed.

“Come on Nathan, let’s not make a big scene out of this.”

Max wasn’t sure how Maxine knew Nathan’s name already.

She was always really freakishly good with them.

Nathan just scoffed and crossed his arms.

“Yeah? And why the fuck not? People need to know ---“

Maxine shook her head,

“People won’t want to hear about the Caulfields and the Prescotts feuding. It won’t be good for either of our families.”

Nathan paused.

Victoria looked confused.

Nathan slowly looked over to Victoria.

“You didn’t tell me this bitch was a Caulfield.”

Victoria shrugged,

“I … didn’t think it was relevant.”

Nathan shook his head again, and started to walk away.

“It’s relevant. Family is **always** relevant. You should know that by now.”

Max never knew how Maxine seemed to know how to effortlessly defuse these situations.

It was like magic, or something.

Victoria frowned and turned her head to follow Nathan as he walked again.

She spared a glance back at Max before turning her heel and following after him.

Max didn’t know how to parse that one, either.

 

Afterwards, Max sighed wearily and collapsed against the wall of lockers.

Maxine patted at her shoulder.

“You okay? Nathan can be a bit of a tough customer.”

Max ran her fingers through her hair and looked at the floor.

“I uhm. Yeah. You could say that. He was pinning me against these, earlier.”

Maxine deflated.

“Oh. _Jerk_.”

Only after the fact did she think to look around to make sure he was out of earshot before looking back to Max.

Max just groaned.

“How do you keep doing this?”

She looked back up to her older sister.

Maxine tilted her head to the side.

“Do what?”

Max shook her head,

“Keep saving me from this stuff. How did you know what to say to him? I thought he was going to kill me or something.”

Maxine looked off into the distance, the way that Nathan had gone.

“You just have to learn people, sweetie. I happen to know Nathan would do anything for his brother and family.”

She looked back to Max,

“You know the Prescotts buy art from your sister, right? On commission? They would be quite upset at him if he did something to upset that.”

Max didn’t, honestly, and just shrugged.

“I don’t remember.”

Maxine nodded, and just patted at her sister’s shoulder again.

“That’s why you’re lucky I’m around, then.”

The thought did make Max smile, if nothing else.

Even if her heart was still going a million miles an hour and it felt like the color would never return from her face.

“Yeah. I guess so.”

Quiet.

 

Max just tired to steady her breathing and calm down from all of the … excitement of the day.

It felt like only seconds later when she heard an unfamiliar voice.

“Hey bitch.”

It wasn’t directed at her, though.

Max looked towards the source of the noise.

Maxine had since taken her hand off of Max’s shoulder and was operating her own locker – conveniently right next to Max’s.

She too looked at the voice.

Two women approach Max and Maxine.

One was about the same height as Max and beset with gorgeously long hair and effusive facial features.

She seemed like the kind of person who could smile all day and never get tired of it.

Next to her, seemingly the opposite kind of woman.

She had a thicker, more muscular build, with very short hair styled upwards.

Patches of it were dyed to a deep blue.

This woman never seemed to smile.

She was also taller than Max or Maxine.

The two new comers agreed in style, at least.

They both looked like they would be at home at a local dive bar that had a punk show playing.

Skinny jeans, boots, jackets, graphic tees, tattoos.

Attitude.

Max quietly absorbed all of this in as Maxine hugged the shorter woman.

“Yo bitch.”

Maxine paused, and after she broke away from the hug, looked to the woman with death on her face,

“Who’s this?”

“This is ---“

The tallest grunted shortly.

“I can talk for myself, thanks.”

Max blinked.

They all looked to the tallest.

That voice was ---

“And you already know me. Or are you all too rich for that shit now? Can’t know any peasants anymore?”

 _Oh no_.

Quiet.

 

Max spoke, first.

She remembered.

“Chloe.”


End file.
